


Patchwork

by Pancakepants



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Amnesia, Anxiety, Depression, EVENTUAL SMUT BUT DON'T WAIT FOR IT, F/F, F/M, Fluff, Horrible Puns, Hurt/Comfort, Like seriously don't wait for the D, Literally strong emotions, More tags before chapters, Night Terrors, PTSD, Panic Attacks, Past-Pacifist Route, Slice of Life, Spaghetti madness, Super duper slow burn, Timeline Awareness, Two POVs, Violence, mental diseases, soul dynamics
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-07
Updated: 2017-01-08
Packaged: 2018-08-13 18:32:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 14
Words: 59,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7981822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pancakepants/pseuds/Pancakepants
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Elisa has just started to cope with her mental issues. By ignoring and hiding them deep inside her mostly, which is not healthy, but she had been doing mediocre, which is much better than most of her life had been. Now she's suddenly meeting new bunch of people - rather energetic monsters, too - and she is fighting the powerful, panicked urge within her to close herself up again, not let anyone close. But she is determined to try, because she has a strange feeling. A good feeling, even.</p><p>These people might very well change her life.</p><p>- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - </p><p>Sans dislikes humans. Until a kind woman with the most amazing soul strolls in. She turns out to be even more infatuating than ketchup. But there's something odd about her. He decides to observe her further(not to just bask next to her soul of course).</p><p>--------------</p><p>SEMI-HIATUS because I'm so swamped with other projects, I apologise!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Not Expected

**Author's Note:**

> This is a fan fiction for MATURE audiences, (EVENTUALLY)containing graphic depictions of violence, mentions of non consent sex, difficult mental disease and later there will be mentions of past child abuse. As the story is still in it's beginning steps, it may not seem so. I will still keep the mature rating. Tags will change once they're less... spoilery. Please don't read this if you are not at least eighteen years old!
> 
> Constructive critisism welcome, hell, even recommended! Especially with writing/grammar. And all comments are welcome :)
> 
> This is my Tumblr with other shit(FONTCEST), come say hi! [+18/NSFW Tumblr, Pancakeuniverse](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Elisa meets a monster couple. It was supposed to be just a short greeting...
> 
> Chapter tags: Safe fodder!, Introduction

Elisa Aarre left her office room at the university after a finished day of writing her latest research paper on friday afternoon. She felt more accomplished than usually for the last few weeks. She had succeeded in getting to know her research group a bit better and she didn’t feel so anxious in her office anymore. She had been able to reduce her anxiety medication slightly, reducing some of the annoying side effects. She started walking to the common rooms to a meeting that was called for a few days ago.

They were receiving the university’s first monster researcher. Monsters had broken the magical Barrier and emerged out of Mt. Ebott 3 years ago. After the panic subsided and world calmed down somewhat, they were let out of their quarantine area 2 months ago and they have obtained full traveling rights in Scotland but otherwise restricted rights in the rest of the United Kingdom and they still weren’t allowed to leave the British Isles. For their own safety, the media said. Which, unfortunately, was mostly true. The monsters slowly started to trickle out of their quarantine zone into the city nearby, moving and settling in. Not without problems and conflicts of course, but even if the progress was slow, it was steady. Some monsters were already enrolled into the university, though most studied online classes. Young monsters had to still keep on studying in their own dedicated schools in monster district for safety purposes.

Elisa was curious about the monsters, but hadn’t really made any effort on getting to know any of them. She’d read about them online and watched videos, even visited their district on a public tour once, a year ago. _Though she tried to speak herself out of it about thirty times, it’s too public, in a place she didn’t know with strangers, what if the monsters didn’t like them there and-_

Ah, well. She’d gone in the end, and it had been educational. She condemned the xenophobic hate speech and the attempted, but fortunately failed terrorist attacks deeply, and couldn’t understand how anyone could hate these people. Well she _could_ , sadly, but felt ashamed at humanity’s stupidity. Just because the monsters’ existence went against their ideals or religion…! She had seen and read zero evidence of the monsters being hostile to humans. Throughout the years it truly seemed that all they wished to do was to live peacefully alongside humans. There were no recorded conflicts, where a monster had attacked a human. It was always about humans attacking monsters, which in turn carefully acted out in self defense, causing minor damage. Sure, some monster hating media sources tried to fabricate such stories, but they had no actual proof, and even those kind of news died down with time.

She was, however, too nervous to do anything more than follow the development from afar. She’d rather bury her thoughts in her work instead. _But now_ , she thought, _now is maybe about time for that fact to change._

Elisa arrived in the common rooms, where few other researchers were already sitting and chatting. In the corner Elisa saw two monsters talking to the Head of the Faculty of Science. The taller of them, approximately 2 meters tall maybe, was a dark blue female monster, with fish-like scales covering her muscular body. She had long, stunning bright red hair tied to a  ponytail, fins instead of ears and her fingers were webbed. She didn’t seem to have a nose. One of her eyes was covered with an eye patch, the other one was yellow with a slit pupil. Her timid smile showing some of her uneven, sharp looking teeth. She was wearing a black tank top, with black jeans and combat boots. Elisa noticed that she seemed to try to be relaxed, but her stance was slightly tense. The other monster was a rather short and looked like a yellow lizard with a big tail and a thick, wavy bone frill surrounding her head. She was wearing thick glasses and a black polka dot dress, with nothing on her feet. She was smiling nervously, while wringing her hands, and was sweating lightly. The Head of the Faculty of Science was smiling, talking leisurely facing the yellow monster. Elisa heard what he was talking about when she got closer.

“... And of course we will give you some freedom with your work during the first few months. You may do research with any faculty, as you have proven to have a wide range of knowledge on all areas. For now you will share an office with a Biochemistry doctoral student and- Oh! Here she is. Elisa, meet Alphys, our new researcher. Undyne is here as a guest.”  
  
They all turned to watch at Elisa, who mentally braced herself, _itwillbefinejuststarttalking_ , smiled and shaked both Alphys’ and Undyne’s hands. Alphys had a shaky but sure handshake, while Undyne’s was quite strong.

“Welcome to the Ebott University! I’ve had the office for myself for quite some time, but I won’t mind the company,” Elisa said while shaking their hands. “Alphys, was it? I can show you the office and if no one has volunteered yet, the rest of the university too, if you’d like.”

Alphys’ face brightened. “T-that would be really nice! I haven’t had a c-chance to look around yet, w-we’ve been busy with m-moving into the city.” She blushed slightly and looked up at Undyne. Undyne flashed a big smile, showing off all of her big, sharp teeth. Elisa’s eyes widened a bit at that, but she maintained a calm, smiling face.

“Alright, nerds! I’ll tag along for the tour, but after that we’ve gotta hurry for lunch, I’m STARVING!” Undyne spoke with a loud voice, ending her phrase almost shouting. People around them shot her slightly nervous glaces. Elisa and the rest chuckled lightly and she quickly wet her lips. _It’s okay, she just has a loud attitude,_ she thought. _Keep calm._

“Well, I won’t keep you long! I’ve already introduced you to the team leader you’ll work for, he will contact you later. I’ll just introduce you to the rest of the faculty quickly and we can all continue our duties,” The Head said brightly, turning to the rest of the room.

He called for everyone’s attention, introducing Alphys while Undyne stepped back. Alphys got over her nervousness and told everyone how she will focus on working with biology, biochemistry and later on medicine in their own faculty, wishing to achieve doctorates from all of them concerning human science and at the same time starting lectures about monster biology and magic at the university. Few people asked some questions, which she answered and some came to talk to her directly. After a while the group dispersed and Elisa asked the monsters to follow her.

Elisa showed them around the Faculty of Science and the different classrooms and laboratories, suggesting that they see to the rest of the university at a later time. They agreed and she lead them to her, now their, office.

Undyne noticed, how her office space was very plain, there was no personal touch, just science books and normal office equipment. They had walked past many rooms and most of the tables had at least some kind of ‘This is my space’ -vibe. Maybe she was just very focused on her work?

“Here we are! It’s nothing fancy, we both have desks, a simple computer and some shelves. Printers are in the corridor. I will be working here on my research paper on most days, my hours change from time to time. Since you have your own key, you are free to come and go however you wish.” Elisa grabbed her back bag, turning to them. “Since Undyne said she wishes to go for lunch, I’ll let you guys off the hook for today and continue home myself too.”

The monsters looked at her silently for a few seconds.

“... Was that a fishing pun?” Undyne asked with a deadpan expression. Elisa had a blank face for a moment, realizing what she had said.

“Oh, I guess it was! I didn’t even think about it. Was that offensive?” She asked innocently. She hadn’t met many monsters before, so she wasn’t sure what kind of a sense of humor they had. She knew she had none.

“HA!! It’s _fin_ e, punk!!”, Undyne barked, slamming a hand on Elisa’s shoulder. She resisted her urge to wince as the movement was sudden and frankly, quite painful. Her knees almost buckled from the force.

“It’s funnier when the joke is unexpected. Just don’t tell Papyrus I said that. Either way, do you wish to join us? We haven’t been to the city that much yet, if you know a place with good grub we’d appreciate it!!”  
  
“Yes, I’d l-like that too. Y-you are more than welcome to c-come along.” Alphys said, smiling a big apologetically, noticing how Undyne’s friendly gesture may have been slightly strong. Elisa tried to calm her suddenly risen heart beat.

“In that case, I’ll ask you to follow me once more! Do you have any wishes?”

The monsters’ faces light up and they both started excitedly asking about sushi restaurants on top of each other. Elisa chuckled and they started walking out of university building while she listed the places she knew of, one was located some ten minutes walking distance off the campus. They got into the cosy little sushi buffet restaurant and settled down to eat. The two monsters chatted lively about japanese food. Elisa was focused on the two bubbly monsters and didn’t notice the looks the other patrons shot at them. She wondered how they even knew about japanese cuisine, not to mention about Japan and voiced her thoughts.

“Information a-about Aboveground has been trickling down t-the river surrounding Mt. Ebott. O-or well, one would call it human trash p-precisely…” Alphys’ smile weakened a bit.

“B-but ‘one man's trash is another man's t-treasure’, right? Throughout the millenium we’ve b-been able to get some information about how h-humans have changed and some bits and pieces about their cultures and t-technology, further developing our own.”

“YEAH, LIKE ANIME!!” Undyne roared. Elisa jolted ever so slightly, hopefully unnoticeably. “I thought those comics and cartoons were human history for the longest time, until Alphys told me otherwise! I thought there would be way more scantily clad heroines flying around with big ass swords fighting mechas, but…” Undyne deflated a bit, sighing. Alphys blushed for some reason and put her claws on Undyne’s arm.

“I-I’m sorry again, Undyne! I s-shouldn’t have fooled you a-and-” Undyne put one of her fingers on Alphys’ lips.

“Yeah I know babe, past is past, I forgave you ages ago already.” They smiled to each other gently. _Ah! They're a couple._

“Well if you guys have any questions about… Aboveground, you said? I’ll be glad to help. I know monsters were only recently allowed to start moving freely away from Ebott, so I can tell about the things you can do in the City, show you around, help with human bureaucracy, such things.”

Elisa realized way too late, how big things she had just promised to couple of monsters she’d just met about two hours ago. What was she doing?! Panic started to swell in her but she managed calm herself down while keeping a small smile on her face as the monsters looked back at her, with slightly raised eyebrows(or in Alphys’ case, brow scales?).

Undyne’s voice was serious, but soft. “... Yeah, that would be great, actually. Humans haven’t been very… receptive with us, cordial at best. There’s a bunch of paperwork we’ve been trying to help Asgore and Toriel with but they really need a human perspective. Why do you make politics so difficult?!” Undyne’s voice raised in the end and she slammed her fist on the table. Her face looked angry and it seemed, that it had bothered them both for quite some time. Elisa wasn’t sure, was it the paperwork or the humans. Or both. _Wait-_

“Did you say… Asgore and Toriel? As in the Dreemurs? The King and Queen of all Monsterkind?” Elisa managed not to squeak. She dug her memory. How had she not remembered? Info about The King and Queen had been spammed the most in all of the media ever since the Barrier broke, with the supposed child ambassador who saved them and the rest of the group, where-

“Y-Yeah. I was the r-royal scientist and Undyne was the Head of the Royal Guard b-back in Underground, we’re still close t-to them both though. W-Which reminds me! Toriel has invited us over for lunch tomorrow, w-w-would you like to come? I’d like t-to thank you for showing us around and helping, I can a-ask if it’s okay to invite you!” Alphys’ nervousness turned into excitement and when Elisa was about to open her mouth to decline - _Oh this is just way too much, I don’t need anything, I didn’t even do anything remotely helpful, I don’t know them at all, I’d probably just pass out_ -

“HELL YEAH! Fast thinking babe! She’ll be able to meet the whole bunch and we haven’t had a human over, well, ever! You’re definitely coming now!! Here, type your number down so we’ll send you all the needed info!” Undyne shoved her phone into Elisa’s hands, whose hands didn’t surprisingly enough shake, while she tapped her phone number and name into her phone in a daze. The other patrons were glaring at them more, some whispering while doing so, some left the place after seeing them, but the monsters were too stoked and Elisa’s mind was too preoccupied with trying to suddenly remember her number, or her own damn name, to notice.

She didn’t get any chances to object nor to say much else either, since the two monsters started to talk giddily about the lunch, then the upcoming dinner, and the following anime night, that they had already planned in their minds in just a matter of seconds.

“We need to show our first human friend a good time after all!!” Undyne roared happily.

_Friend?_

Alphys seemed to notice that Elisa’s already pale skin had turned even paler, and suggested that they just stick to the lunch plans for now, and see if she’d like to do anything more afterwards. They'd finished eating a long time ago, so they started to leave. Undyne insisted, that they will pay for her dinner, her weak objections completely ignored. They walked back to the monsters’ car. Elisa successfully convinced them, that she doesn’t need a ride, she wants to drive her bicycle home anyways. Which wasn’t a lie, she liked cycling, but she really, _really_ needed to get going. Alone. And she didn’t want to take the monsters back to her apartment, at least not yet, it was has safe place from everyone. She was still stunned while cycling home for half an hour, and when she finally closed her apartment door and said hello to her 2 meowing cats, she allowed her brain to recoil to a certain degree.

 _W-What was that???_ She’d wanted to just introduce herself to her new office roommate(which in itself was a **_HUGE_ ** deal to her already!!) and maybe help her with any _small_ questions she might have. The last thing she had expected to be shocked by today, was being invited to a monster lunch to THE Queen Toriel’s residence, as the first human ever to visit them apparently, whom the couple had already stamped with the Friend label. She wasn’t sure when was the last time she’d ever called anyone her friend. And she gave them her number! What if they don’t like her? What if she brings them down or upsets them somehow? What if she can’t help them with whatever questions they have? What if she snaps and her alt-

She realized suddenly that she was getting too riled up. Breathing was hard, her thoughts were getting hazy, and her whole body was shaking instead of just her hands. She knelt, straightened her back, forced all her muscles to relax with a few whole body muscle contractions and started taking deep breaths. Slowly she regained control of her thoughts and emotions. _That was too close. Guess I need to take a bigger dose tomor- no. I_ **_must_ ** _take a bigger dose for tomorrow, the meeting with Undyne and Alphys said enough of what kind of a lunch it will be._

Finally she stood up. Her evening plans were some relaxing exercises in the basement and sitting on the floor in the darkness meditating for one or two more hours than usually. She clearly needed to practice her self-control more. Things have been too calm lately, she’d been slacking off. But for the first time in a long time, she felt a rare emotion fluttering in her chest. _Excitement?_ … _Mixed with fear?_

 

_Oh, I just wish I get out of there without us doing something stupid._

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's gonna be an exciting(or dreadful) day tomorrow! *-*


	2. At Nerves End

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing a naked lady and salmiakki
> 
> Chapter tags: Minor panic attack, more introduction, migraine
> 
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

Elisa woke up at 6:30 am, to her alarm clock. Which surprised her positively, since more often than not, she’d become aware of being awake, showered, clothed and standing in her kitchen at around 7:30 am. She’d gotten so used to it that now she wasn't sure how to continue from there. She also hadn’t had any kind of dreams. Win again! She checked her phone, noticing(shocked) that she had received 3 messages. She hadn’t checked her phone in the evening. She usually didn’t have a reason to.

 **Unknown number** : Hi Elisa! This is Alphys. It was nice to meet you yesterday! Toriel said it’s okay that you come for lunch. Here’s the address info. See you there at 12! Or do you need a ride? We can pick you up.

 **Unknown number** : YOU BETTER SHOW UP PUNK I TOLD PAPYRUS I’M BRINGING A HUMAN AND HE’S TOTES EXCITED!!!!

 **Unknown number** : Hello there! This is Toriel Dreemurr. Alphys has told me they’d like to invite someone from work for lunch at twelve a’clock. You are more than welcome to join us! She gave me your number, but said she’d send you the address, since I’m not so good with phones yet. Don’t worry about bringing anything. ]:)

Elisa saved the numbers _(when have I saved a number last time? Or received a message from someone else than mom?)_ And answered them all politely. Thank you, she didn’t need a ride, haha, glad I’m expected _(but seriously, who is Papyrus(isn’t that a font) and should I be worried?)_ and most politely she answered to Her Majesty about being honored to join them for lunch, and that she couldn’t wait. Even though she was feeling more and more anxious and she’d been awake only for 10 minutes. _Hoo kay._

She got up, took her morning pills, a _bit_ bigger dose than normal this time, made her morning 10 minute stretch routine, while Hippa and Lievo were meowing and pushing against her limbs, and headed for shower. Afterwards she dried her hair and body and looked in her full body mirror, still naked.

Elisa's 160cm body was thin but toned, her skin was very pale. She had no curves, her body shape was rather boyish. Her shoulder length thin hair was natural blonde with her eyebrows, her eyes were deep blue. Her face and shoulders were still red from the hot shower. She didn’t pay attention to her looks, only her health. However, she noticed a change she for some reason didn’t notice in the shower. She was looking at her groin, irritated.

Wha- When- _ugh_. She was freshly shaved. All of her mound, labia and legs. She shaved her armpits for comfort, but she didn’t care about the rest of her hair. She chopped the hair on her head shorter from time to time to keep it easy to manage but still long enough for a ponytail. This wasn’t the first time this happened, however. Not even close. She looked at the clock.

 _It was 7:32. She’d been in the shower for over 50 minutes, when it had felt only like 10._ So that’s when it had happened then. She hadn’t noticed anything since she’d stayed in the shower, except that suddenly she’d felt hot and... _satisfied_ and slightly out of breath for a moment. Still annoyed about the lost time and unneeded, unwanted shaving, she forced the vexation out of her mind and focused on continuing her morning. Like a normal person with no amnesia and… stuff happening. _Yeah, like thinking like that is going to help._ She put on her clothes; basic underwear, white socks, beige pants and a blue pullover. Her outdoor clothes would be black sneakers and a black hoodie. She looked like this almost everyday and people might say that she looks plain. Which she was, but no one said a thing, nor did she care. Clothes are just something to keep her warm and dry. It shouldn’t rain today, so she didn’t prepare any rain clothes, except for a small foldable rain poncho, just in case. Otherwise she just took her wallet and keys in her pockets. She put the items on the table next to the front door.

Noniin. Hmm.

Toriel had written she didn’t need to worry about bringing anything. Which was a relief, since she hadn’t prepared anything. The thought hadn’t even crossed her mind yesterday in her hazed state. _But it also wasn’t a relief_. What if the Queen was just being polite? Maybe she was expecting something after all. Or maybe the other guests would think it rude of her not to bring anything. Maybe they will resent her and the visit will end abruptly there and- Ah! She went into the kitchen, ignoring her excited meowing cats for a moment. Her mother had visited home in Helsinki some time ago and brought her sweets, even though she told her she doesn’t eat them and she brought them anyways, so they were in the cupboard. She took bags of salmiakki, liquorice and chocolate, found a clean looking paper bag and took them to the front door table. There. It’s something AND it’s from abroad! Perfect gift!

… Did monsters even eat sweets?

She felt a headache crawling in if she kept on worrying, so she forced herself to calm down, fed Hippa and Lievo and started doing a light breakfast. Two sandwiches and a cup of orange juice later, she settled down on her sofa to read, to pass the time. Finally, it was 10 am and she felt comfortable enough to go. Probably because of the drugs. Luckily, the side effects would only kick in in the evening. The timing should be fine.

Queen Toriel Dreemurr lived quite far away, on the foot of the mountain, in the Monster District. She decided to take her bike in the bus and cycle the rest of the way, human traffic still didn’t go into the district. She got into the bus, just looking at the view.

Ebott City was beautiful. Mt. Ebott covered half of the horizon, the very top of it covered in snow. The rest was covered in forest, the suburbs starting few kilometers off the foot of the mountain, downtown being some 20 km away. Elisa lived at the edge of downtown, close to the university. Most of the streets had trees planted on them and there were multiple parks. Through the years, after the Barrier was broken, the forests on the foot of the mountain were thinned out, and crude houses were built for the monsters. They had done most of the work themselves, with the timber they were allowed to take from the mountain, as most humans wouldn’t dare to go close. The ones who did go closer, went there just to ogle at the district border, guarded by the military. Only a few human construction companies went to help with the building, lured by the gold of the monsters. Most likely they demanded multiple times the price of normal work.

Elisa realized that she was getting close, as the houses changed to trees in her view. She saw the fence surrounding the whole mountain. Soon she got off and cycled to the fence. Monsters and humans could move freely in and out of the district now, but everyone’s information was taken to see who moved and when. She moved through the metal detector and continued cycling. At least they didn’t check her physically. Things were really tense for quite a while after the two attempted and failed terrorist bombings 2 years ago, when human visitors were first time allowed in the area. She checked her phone quickly to check she was on the right street. _The drugs are working,_ she mused. here were many different kinds and shapes of monsters looking at her curiously and she only _barely_ felt like curling into a ball and rolling right back to her apartment. _It will go fine, I’m sure of it!_

She finally arrives to the light blue 2-story villa that was gifted to the King and Queen, and the ambassador child they had adopted. _Kidnapped_ , most people say, but after the military had taken the kid away for few days, they returned her back to them, since they hadn’t found any of her original family members and she had fervently wanted to stay with them. Adoption wasn’t a thing for monsters, at least yet. But they at least got her back… Which made Elisa realize. She will meet her. Frisk, the saviour of all Monsters. Who is the adoptive daughter of the Queen of all Monsters. Who she will also be meeting.

She was _so grateful_ she took that extra dose now.

It was 11:45 am. She supposed it’s polite to be slightly early. She rang the doorbell and held onto the snack bag, rubbing the handle, staring at the door. The door opened after a moment and she had to crank her head up to meet the monster’s face. Her face looked like one of a goat, elongated and with large, droopy ears, though instead of horizontal slits she had round pupils, irises the color of amethyst. She had small, white horns, she was covered in white, fluffy looking fur and she had a violet, full body dress on. She was wearing nothing on her feet- erm, back paws. _Aren't they supposed to be hooves?_ She had a reserved, but warm smile. _Are those fangs that I’m seeing? Ohwaitrighttimetotalk-_

Elisa curtsied lightly. “Hello! My name is Elisa. Alphys invited me here for lunch.  It is a great honor to meet you, Queen Toriel.” Toriel looked flustered for a second, blushing slightly.

“Oh please, Toriel is enough. I renounced that name a long time ago, though I still use it for human media. Now I’m just a normal monster mother.” _How do I see the blush with her fur- oh lord is she going to hug me-_

Toriel did indeed hug her gently, seemingly losing some, if not all of her reservation towards her. Elisa hugged back, reminding herself to try to hug properly. Body contact, aside from handshakes, was not something she was used to. She felt sweat gathering on her back. Toriel glanced behind Elisa, gasping lightly.

“Oh, my child, you didn’t come all the way with a bicycle, did you?!” Elisa glanced behind her, where she had locked her bike next to the car she recognized to be Undyne's, next to it there was a red convertible. Before she could answer, she heard stomping steps coming from inside the house.

“SHE DID WHAT??” Undyne bellowed, coming to stand next to Toriel. Her face was a combination of angry, amused and disappointed.

“Nerd, I thought Alphys told you we can scoop you with us! You were on the way and everything.”

“I came to the fence with the bus and then cycled here. It was rather pleasant!” Elisa smiled. She was honest too, she did like watching at the scenery and cycling in the crispy, fresh air. The foot of the mountain was slightly higher from the sea level. Her heart lurched again when Undyne hugged her, surprisingly gently.

“Well, we’re taking you back. We’ll bring your bicycle to you later.” Undyne’s tone didn’t leave any space for disagreement, nor did Elisa want to argue with a brawny, sharp toothed fish monster. So she just swallowed and nodded weakly. “That is very kind of you.”

“Well, let’s get her in so she meets everyone else and we can start eating!” Toriel clapped her hands( _paws? No, those are just furry hands_ ) together and they got into the house.

It opened directly into a large living room, on left side there was a big dining table and a round staircase, on the right a half circle of blue sofas facing a fireplace. All of the furniture was elegant, fitting together with the wooden floors and walls. On the back wall there were few doors, probably one going to the kitchen. The smell of savoury food, something sweet, the fireplace and the wood of the villa gave the place a very cosy atmosphere, combined with the natural light coming from the large windows. Elisa took her shoes off, leaving them next to the door and took her hoodie off, holding it together with the snack bag and turned to see Alphys coming to her. She was prepared for the hug this time, hugging more comfortably. Supposedly she was gaining hugging experience. _Ha._

“It’s great t-that you came! We were wondering, s-since you didn’t answer to the texts yesterday.” Alphys said, her stuttering clearly decreased.

“Of course I wanted to come. I didn’t check my phone yesterday. I felt unsure about it being okay with me coming to visit Her M- I mean, Toriel, but I am more than glad to be received so warmly.”

The words just flowed out of Elisa’s mouth. She was just being honest, again. Actually, she just didn’t lie. Lying always made her uneasy. And now, though she had to concentrate on keeping her breathing stable and hands from shaking, she was truly… glad. Happy, even. It was a weird feeling, after… she didn’t remember how long. The other monsters were smiling with her.

“I’d like you to meet Frisk, my daughter.” Toriel beckoned a child to come to her, who had been hiding behind a sofa. She had brown hair, brown eyes and she seemed to around 10 years old. Elisa had seen her often enough on the news to recognize her. “Hello!” She smiled widely, but stayed at Toriel’s side. As if she was wary of her. Maybe she was shy.

“Hello there.” Elisa had no experience with kids. This kid also happened to be the one to free a whole _species_ from a millennium of imprisonment. She wasn’t sure how to act with her, but she smiled warmly at her either way.

“so, is this the human i’ve been hearing about?”

Elisa turned to the sofas, only now noticing there was a person sitting. _Is… is that- is he a skeleton?_ Elisa kept her smile the way it was and made sure she was not staring.

 _… Interesting_.

All the other monsters she had seen or met, resembled some animal or a matter of nature - was it then fire, rock, jelly, water, you name it - But his body resembled a human skeleton. Clothed in a blue hoodie with a fluffy white hood, white t-shirt, black basketball shorts, white socks and… pink, fluffy slippers. His skull was rounder and the limbs she saw had thicker bones than a human skeleton would have. His eye sockets were completely dark apart from dim, round… pupils?... lights, that were pointed at her. He didn’t have eyebrows, but the supraorbital region on top of his eye sockets seemed to be malleable, since he was raising a single eyebr-  _brow bone_ at her. His grin( _Why is he grinning, or can’t he help it?_ ) was also covered slightly with this malleable bone matter, functioning a bit like cheeks and lips. For once, she was glad for her ability to be able to take a large amount of information in in a fraction of a second, without losing her calm.

“Hello, my name is Elisa. If by ‘this human’ you mean Alphys’ university office roommate, that would be me.” She stayed still, since he also stayed sitting on the sofa, seemingly relaxed. But his grin didn’t seem to reach his eyes. She got a feeling that he was actually tense, watching her carefully, for whatever reason.

“you guys share a room, huh? I hope you guys form a _staple_ working relationship.”

His mouth didn’t move when he talked. Undyne, Alphys and Frisk groaned, Toriel tittered silently, hiding her mouth with her hand. His low baritone voice sounded amused.

“just make sure they don’t _bind’er_ with too much work.”

While the others were groaning or tittering, Elisa realized he was looking at her, waiting for a reaction. What for- Oh. Jokes were really not her thing, but she did find puns clever.

“Oh! Those are office puns, right? Let me try.” She thought for a second. “I’m sure we will both be _glued_  to work!”

The skeleton’s brow bones raised, his grin widened and he snickered. His wider grin showed two large, dull canine teeth. _… Humans don’t have those. Huh._

“great, a person who appreciates puns. the _fax_ is, you’re the first human to visit toriel just for lunch. I’m glad you share our sense of humor.”

Elisa thought of another one.

“ _Supplies_!” she said, louder than her usual calm voice. The groaning people groaned even harder now and both the skeleton and Toriel started laughing. She also heard a mixture of a loud, high shriek and groan coming from the other room.

“BROTHER! I HOPE YOU ARE NOT INFECTING OUR GUESTS WITH YOUR ABOMINABLE JOKES! I HEAR THEM ENOUGH FROM YOU AND TOR-”

At the door, leading probably to the kitchen, stood another skeleton. This one however, was as tall as Toriel and Undyne, almost reaching the upper door frame. First of all, he was _loud_. His voice was higher than the other skeleton's and it had a nasal tone. He was wearing jeans and a orange flannel shirt with white socks. His front was covered with a pink, ruffled apron which read ‘COOKING DUDE’. His small, dark eye sockets seemed to move on his skull, as if they functioned as pupils, and his teeth were huge, but attached to the skull, akin to a human skeleton. His face also seemed malleable. She interpreted his facial expression to be nearly hysterical, his tooth row curving upwards and his cheekbones raised up to his eye sockets, making them seem crinkled. His bone hands were lifted to the sides of his skull. He was emitting a high pitched sound of ‘ _EEEEEEEEEE_ ’.

“IS THIS THE HUMAN WHOM ALPHYS INVITED OVER FOR LUNCH??” His jaw opened when he talked. Alphys nodded to him.

“H-Hello, I’m Elisa. I met Alphys and Undyne yesterday. It’s nice to meet you.” She felt her just regained, still unsteady calm falter while looking at the towering skeleton, but she raised her right hand, preparing for a handshake.

Many things happened at the same time, during the next few seconds.

The tall skeleton started stomping towards her. It felt like he was towering on top of her, blocking all light. He looked menacing like that. It felt like she was cornered. She took a small, quivering step backwards.

The smaller skeleton was standing suddenly. “hey bro, maybe you shouldn’t-”

He grabbed her into a tight hug, raising her off the floor. Her hands went limp and she dropped her hoodie and the paper bag.

_Oh no._

Elisa felt trapped. She felt her breathing and heart rate fasten. Too fast. Too tight. No escape. She felt her consciousness slowly fading. She realized, that even though she'd been carefully controlling her emotions for a very long time and even though she'd taken her medication… She felt strong fear creep from inside her. The kind she could not allow to manifest. Preferably never, but especially not here, not now.

_It’sjustahugit’sjustahugit’sjustahug **i’mscared** i’mnotbeingattackedeverythingisfinethesepeoplearenice **heisgoingtohurtme** heisjustbeingfriendlyiamcompletelysafe- _

“Papyrus! Dude you just met her, you can’t-”

 _-I’msafei’msafei’msafei’msafe_ **_ineedtogetaway_ ** _i’msafei’msafei’msafe -_

“OH IT IS SO WONDERFUL THAT WE FINALLY HAVE HUMAN VISITOR!! I HAVE WANTED TO MAKE HUMAN FRIENDS FOR YEARS NOW BUT FOR SOME REASON THEY ALL EITHER RUN AWAY SCREAMING OR MAKE SOME EXCUSE AND I NEVER SEE THEM AGAIN AND-”

“ ** _bro_**. put her down.”

The tall skeleton finally noticed, that Elisa was completely stiff, shaking, barely breathing, with her eyes firmly closed, eyebrows scrunched together. He gently put her down and stepped back.

“OH! I AM S- I am sorry, I got too excited. I forget that I may look dangerous to humans. I hope I did not scare you. Oh stars, are you okay?”

-  _okit’soverit’soverit’sover_ ** _getoutyouhaveachancenow_** _NOeverythingisfinenowcalmdowncalmdowncalmdown_ -

“hey, pal, it’s okay. you’re safe. you still here with us, buddy?”

Elisa opened her eyes and saw the shorter skeleton- who was actually just slightly shorter than her- at her side, looking at her, keeping his fing- _phalanges_ up in a calming expression. He didn’t touch her, which she was glad about. In spite of his grin, he looked worried. She glanced at the others and they all looked worried. _I can’t let them see._

She closed her eyes again, straightened her back, forced her shaking to stop and forced herself to take in deep breaths. She didn’t use this method often, as it didn’t always work, and it tired her mind tremendously. She hadn’t needed it in multiple years, but she had to try. She concentrated.

 _I AM SAFE. NO ONE WILL HURT ME. I_ **_WILL_ ** _CALM DOWN._

_\- - - - - - - - -_

Suddenly, it seemed to the monsters and Frisk, she was her normal, calm self again. They were slightly taken aback. _Was I that obvious?_

“... I’m sorry. I don’t meet new people that often and I’m jittery with loud noises and physical touches, especially with strangers. You did nothing wrong… Papyrus, was it?” She smiled at the tall skeleton. He and the others looked appalled.

“You do not need to apologise for anything! I clearly stepped over normal boundaries! I am the one who needs to apologise!”

“Y-You should have told us t-that you feel anxious. We w-w-would’ve been more careful, I mean, I-I know how that feels. I should have n-noticed…”

“Truly, my child, you have done nothing wrong. We didn’t know, but we should have been more careful too. I was too excited, also. But you feel better now, right? Would you like some tea while we finish up preparing the food?”

Elisa watched at the monsters. Toriel had a gentle, caring smile( _Why is she calling me her child_ ), Papyrus looked upset, Alphys looked sad, Undyne was holding her bicep with an unsure face and Frisk looked concerned too. She had an expression that did not fit her age, as if she was more mature. The shorter skeleton had his normal grin on. He was unreadable, as if on purpose. Elisa needed to fix the atmosphere.

“Please, you have all been so kind! Don’t do anything different for me. It’s my fault for being like this, anyways. But I do accept the tea and I’d like to show you to the snacks I brought! I know you told me not to bring anything, but I thought they can function as snacks after the lunch. They’re finnish sweets.” Elisa smiled brightly, picking her hoodie and the paper bag up from the floor.

The monsters seemed to calm down. Frisk squeaked at the mention of sweets. “In that case, I’ll go prepare the tea. Papyrus, could you help me with the lunch? And Undyne, could you prepare the table?”

“I ACCEPT THIS MISSION! I WILL HELP YOU WITH ALL MY MIGHT, MY QUEEN!!”

“Yeah, of course. Babe, wanna come help?” “S-Sure!”

Elisa and the shorter skeleton were suddenly left alone in the wide living room. She felt surprisingly calm. She was still feeling some of the adrenaline rush, but she knew she could relax a bit for now. _Wait, maybe I should help with the lunch, why am I just standing here-_

“sorry ‘bout my bro, he can be such a _bonehead_ sometimes. good to see that you could calm down. the name’s sans, by the way.”

Elisa turned to the shorter skeleton _(he’s also a font?),_ who was holding his hand up towards her. She took his hand to shake it-

Ppfffffffrrrrffbtbtbtbtbt.

She really didn’t enjoy jokes. But this surprised her. She let out a small laugh.

Sans’ eye lights brightened a bit. “heh. the ole whoopie cushion in the hand trick. it never fails to entertain.”

Frisk was tittering behind Sans. Elisa chuckled and took her hand away. She noticed how his hand’s bones had both smooth and rough spots and how warm it was. “Do you greet everyone like that?”

“nah, just some monsters. haven’t met humans worth doing it for, except for frisk.”

Elisa wondered at that. Surely there’s been other humans they’ve met, better at interaction than her. But she let it slide and sat down on the sofa, with the other two. Toriel arrived soon, holding a large plate with a beautiful tea set, supplied with sugar, milk, lemon wedges and small cookies. Elisa took her tea plain. It had an exquisite taste and aroma. She felt the last of her tense, sore muscles finally relax and she took a slow, deep breath. She put the sweet bags on the table. Toriel made sure Frisk wouldn’t eat too many cookies or had too much sugar in her tea, also telling her that Elisa’s sweets were for after lunch. Sans inspected the bags curiously while sipping( _... how does that wor- Oh right don’t stare)_ his tea. They had small talk with Toriel and Sans mostly talking, throwing puns at each other. Elisa said something when she felt polite to do so. Mostly she focused on the tea though, it calmed her somehow more than she expected. Soon Undyne, Alphys and Papyrus were done with preparations and they moved onto the dining table. There was meatloaf, mashed potatoes, salad, a _snail_ pie she learned, various juices and a butterscotch pie for dessert.

She took her first bite.

... _Woah..._

Elisa didn’t care for food that much. It was just sustenance. She cooked her own food since it was relaxing and she could make sure it was healthy, but it was plain most of the time. But this food… It seemed so simple, but tasted magnificent. She'd never had anything like it before. It was as if the food just melted in her mouth and all her taste receptors were just shocked into amazement. She had to bite down a shrill of delight. _Okei, Elisa, calm down. This may be the best food ever but there’s no need to become frenzied over it._ She congratulated Toriel the best she could, though she couldn’t find proper words to describe the food without sounding almost... intimate. Toriel blushed.

“Please my child, it’s just normal home food cooked with fire magic. It may be that it tastes peculiar to you because of that.”

 _So, this was magic food?_ Elisa hummed, continued eating and got lost into her thoughts, while the others were talking. She’d felt a wave of questions building up inside her throughout the day. About magic. About their bodies. About Frisk and the Underground. About Sans and Papyrus, how did their bones stick together, how did their clothes look filled, _Why is Sans drinking ketchup_ , how did they talk, breathe, move, drink, eat- _I mean, they’re shoving food into their mouths without chewing and it just disappears somewhere after a while, I didn’t see any going in front of the neck vertebrae_ \- She’d lost count of how many questions she had. This emotion she was familiar with, but now it was stronger than ever. Her chest was burning with curiosity. However, she was sure it would be very rude to ask anything. She wouldn’t ask anything so personal from a human, why would a monster be different? So she made sure her face was calm, smiling, and that she didn’t look at anyone or anything for too long. And she listened to them talk. She was very good at listening.

Elisa realized she'd seen all of them together in the pictures from years ago, when the Barrier fell down. They were the first ones to come out, but only Frisk, Toriel and Asgore stayed the most in publicity, Alphys and Undyne sometimes, because of their old jobs. The bunch was very energetic, and she was slowly getting used to how loud they were. Undyne and Alphys were discussing, what new furniture they still needed to buy. Their week was going to be busy, with Alphys getting started at the university and Undyne already had a full schedule at the gym where she'd started to work as a personal trainer. When the patrons realized, how hard she worked to get them in shape(and her menacing, toothy grin and threats of even harder exercise probably worked as an encouragement too), she was fully booked for months to come. So their next Saturday was probably the next time they could go shopping.

Papyrus chatted joyfully about his yesterday’s workday at the brand new amusement park Miracle Mountain, which hired a lot of monsters. The founder had made sure that the monsters he hires understand, that they are going to work not only their assigned post, but also as public attractions. Tourism in Ebott City had exploded, ever since the Barrier broke. When fearful people had shunned the monsters and wanted to have nothing to do with them, curious people from all over the world wanted to come and see them for their own eyes. Not to make friends with them, they just wanted to stare at them and take pictures to laugh at back at home. _As if they were just objects_. Elisa found it ridiculous, but then again, tourists did that with different cultures too, turning them into a circus act to ogle at.

But Papyrus couldn’t have been happier. He seemed to know what he had gotten into. He worked there as the greeter/guard at the front gate and the visiting children adored him because of his bubbly, outward attitude. He announced that he was writing down how many hugs he got per day _(“I HIT THE RECORD ON WEDNESDAY, WITH 25 HUGS!!!”)_. Elisa noticed the soft, gentle grin on Sans’ face when he listened to his brother talk.

Toriel asked if Frisk’s homework was done, as she had her lecture on Monday in the Monster School Toriel had founded, but could only teach in it after she had received her teaching license. Frisk was still, after 3 years, the only human student in the school, but as the fence was more open now, maybe more humans would like to bring their children in. It was unlikely for a long time, but Toriel was hopeful.

Elisa asked Sans, where did he work. He curtly explained, that he was a night guard at a large store house, which required him to make rounds from time to time and then he had some time for a break _(“MEANING HE IS SLEEPING ON THE JOB ONCE MORE, HE IS SUCH A LAZYBONES”)_ , before starting the rounds again. Sans asked her the same thing and she started explaining about her latest research project regarding cancer. They didn’t understand what she was talking about, since it was human science. Monsters were mostly constructed of magic and they didn’t have similar diseases compared to humans. She tried her best to explain, how humans are constructed of cells, which’ genetic code can mutate and turn the cells to work against the human’s body. Alphys, and surprisingly Sans, were very interested and asked a lot of questions. Sooner or later the lunch was finished _(The snail pie was also surprisingly good)_ and the discussion shifted to her promise to help them with human bureaucracy.  
  
“Like I told Alphys and Undyne yesterday, if any of you have any difficulties with paperwork, or have questions about humans, any kind really, I’d be more than glad to help.” Elisa felt joyful. She felt happy and relaxed around these people that she had only met, and for now she wanted to hold on to that feeling, and do her everything to pay them back for their generosity and company.  
  
“My child, it is very generous of you to offer your help, and we don’t want to overburden you. But I will inform King Asgore about your offer in case he needs it. Humans have not made the integration of our species into the society easy.” Toriel’s voice sounded bitter, when she mentioned the King.

It felt like Elisa’s heart jolted once more. How many times will this happen today before it will just jump out of her rib cage?

_I could meet the King…?_

“I’m not sure will my help be worthy to his Majesty, but I will do my best!” She proclaimed, her calm wavering, as she couldn’t hold her excitement. Her company chuckled.

“Dude, King Fluffybuns will be happy for any help he gets! He’s buried with work, so anything you do for him, he will accept with gratitude. He’s just such a numbskull that he never asks for help, trying to carry all the burden himself.” Undyne said, as they started to clean the table and move towards the sofas.

Elisa could sense, that there was a lot unsaid about the King. She only knew that the King and Queen were living separated and that Frisk visited the King from time to time. Toriel looked slightly disgruntled when he was discussed, the others looked a bit sad. Even though Sans’ grin was unreadable, his eye lights burned brighter for a moment. _It feels like… resentment?_

The subject was changed, as they sat down and Elisa translated the sweet bags to them. She told them, that the chocolate was normal, but they might want to use caution when tasting the liquorice and salmiakki, which was like liquorice but saltier. Frisk’s face scrunched up after tasting both of them, announcing that the chocolate was the best. The others liked the liquorice a bit more. Elisa didn’t expect any them to like the salmiakki, but-

“oh man. this is the best. i want more of this stuff, where do i buy this from?”

Sans looked pleasantly surprised, while he was... _chewing?_  the tough salmiakki candy in his mouth. Elisa snorted, rather unattractively.

“My mother brought it from Helsinki when she was visiting our relatives. I don’t eat sweets, so you can have the whole bag. I can ask someone to send me more if you’d like.” _… Wait. Did I just snort oh dear god I did not just snort-_

“cool. thanks kid, you’re so _sweet_. if you _sticky’round,_ i might ask you for _s’more_.”

Groans and giggles filled the room. Papyrus practically shrieked.

“MY GETTING-TO-KNOW-A-HUMAN-DAY IS RUINED BECAUSE OF YOU, SANS!”

Elisa laughed gently and thought of a fitting retort. “Don’t worry Papyrus, his puns won’t chase me away. I won’t _sugarcoat_ it, I haven’t had this much fun in a long time. I’d like to see you all again, if you’ll just have me.”

Sans laughed. Papyrus groaned at the pun, but his face brightened tremendously.  
  
“THAT IS WONDERFUL! HUMAN, I WILL INVITE YOU TO VISIT MY AND SANS’ APARTMENT TOMORROW! I STILL NEED TO APOLOGISE SINCE I SCARED YOU, SO I WILL MAKE YOU SOME OF MY FAMOUS SPAGHETTI!!” Sans’ eye lights widened slightly, but he said nothing.

 _Tomorrow won’t do_. She started to feel her anxiety medication wearing off and she hadn’t brought any more with her, since she thought the effect would last longer. Forcefully calming herself down earlier didn’t help, either. She was getting tired, her head felt like it will start to hurt soon, and her hands were already shaking ever so slightly. She needed to go soon and she wouldn’t be presentable before Monday. She answered truthfully.

“I’m sorry Papyrus, I can’t come tomorrow. You apologised already, so no need for that, but I can come visit either way. How about I come on Monday evening for dinner?”

“THAT’S A BRILLIANT IDEA!!!”

“s’fine for me. It should be cold next week, don’t forget to wear a _sweet_ er.”

“SANS!!!”  
  
They chatted for a while longer, but Elisa knew that her headache would get much worse soon. She told them that she needs to go home to take care of her cats(which was true) and Undyne and Alphys agreed, that they can leave with her. Papyrus got her phone number and sent her their address. Toriel said that she was welcome to visit any time, and she would invite her over if there were any events. Undyne remembered that she had a bike rack in her car so they could take her bike with them. After farewell hugs from everyone _(I'm getting really good at this, didn’t even flinch or tense)_ , they quickly got to her apartment. She felt comfortable with them knowing where she lived. It’s not like they were going to barge in all the time, demanding to be let in, right?

After the last goodbyes, she got in, fed the cats and closed the blackout curtains in her bedroom. Her whole body was shaking steadily now and half of her view was blocked by auras. With her pounding headache, every movement added to the pain and she carefully climbed onto her bed. Too tired to move but too much in pain and nausea to sleep, all she could do was lay down and breathe. She didn’t want to puke, that would be waste of the Queen’s food, so she resisted strictly.

_Even with all of this… I would do this whole day all over again._

After a few hours that felt like eternity, she fell into restless sleep.

 

/ / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /

 

Sans looked at her leave with Undyne and Alphys. He turned to Frisk.

“you saw the change too right, kid? in her soul?”

Frisk looked concerned.

“... Yeah.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How do you like the small additions of finnish? I thought it might give a small personal touch to the OC.


	3. Basking in Bliss

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing shit ton of background and POV Sans getting high from emotions on Saturday
> 
> Chapter tags: Humanity sucks, soul introduction
> 
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

Sans slumped down on the sofa, watching his brother buzz around, cleaning the villa excitedly while Toriel was preparing the lunch. Papyrus had demanded that they arrive 2 hours early so that everything would be ready for the human’s arrival. He clenched his jaw.

_i don’t like this one bit._

When Undyne called Papyrus on Friday evening, telling him about the great human friend they had made in only a few hours and whom they’d invited over to Toriel’s. Of course Papyrus was thrilled, his joints coloring orange and humming with excited surplus magic. “be careful paps, or your arm will fall off. i don’t need you to _lend me a hand_ right now”, he had told him, but Papyrus had just kept on running around the apartment all evening too agitated to calm down, before he collapsed and abruptly fell asleep on the floor. Sans had had to levitate him, holding his soul, into his bed.

Sans didn’t have any good memories about the past humans he had met. They were mostly hostile the first few months after monsters had gotten through the Barrier. It was a miracle that no monsters were killed. The hostility was to be expected, their species was somehow long forgotten and they were considered aliens, who could mean harm to them. The military officers interacting with them would always seem serious, angry, afraid, disgusted. Those who didn’t feel that way stayed silent not to anger their commanders, which is almost equally bad in Sans’ eyes. However, the monsters persevered, never causing any problems, never attacking humans, only defending themselves when necessary. Even when Frisk was forcefully taken away from them for a while since the humans believed she was forced to be there, Asgore and Toriel stayed calm, wanting to show them that the monsters truly only wanted to coexist peacefully. The human government at least were smart enough to realize this and started to work for peaceful solutions. Slowly, the quarantine fence was built around the mountain and the monsters were allowed to start building.

Human interaction after that didn’t get much better. Once the humans found out about their large gold storages, their tone drastically changed. Anger and greed were not common in the Underground, but he learned fast to recognize the second one. The workers who were hired to help with building the colony were rude and seemed to always try to raise their prices higher. Media was let in slowly and the fakeness and vanity of some of the reporters was palpable. A woman wanted to interview him and Papyrus and he accepted, wanting to contribute to presenting the monster’s good side. He hated it, but he knew it was important. Papyrus was happy to do anything to help, really. The woman, first seemingly sweet, asked them questions about how did it feel to be up finally, what did they do when they first got out, the normal shtick. However, she then started asking about their opinion on do they really deserve to get off the mountain? She said it was nice that they _visited_ the surface and all, but shouldn’t they start going back now? Because this was their land. _Humans’ land,_ and monsters didn’t belong there. Her voice quickly took a toxic tone and she clearly wanted to rile them up, to do something in front of the camera. He just started walking away dragging confused Papyrus with him and didn’t give any more interviews after that.

Weeks turned to months turned to years and even though he had had some neutral, even cordial interactions with humans, they were drowned by the negative ones. Not only were there actual attempted terrorist attacks and straight up assaults, there were plenty of humans unwilling to help monsters with finding a job, police turning a blind eye when a monster needed help, parents turning away fast with their curious children, hooligans throwing garbage and spitting on monsters that were just peacefully walking down the street, vain tourists acting as if they were animals or items whom they could just walk to and demand them to show them a magic trick or they’d report them doing something illegal... Monsters are not normally capable of strong, negative emotions to even _start_ to think about killing anyone, when humans have a strong Intent for anything they set their minds to. There were multiple monster casualties, not one dead human over the 3 years. And they were reported in the humans’ _entertainment news, since finding a pile of dust instead of a body was ‘hilarious’_. Even now, after things had calmed down some since security had been increased, monsters got protective laws and monsters were more common in the public with more rights, it was still normal to receive scowls and shouted or whispered insults.

He had almost lost all hope for humanity.

Which is why it was worrying that Toriel would just accept some random human into her house. She could’ve tricked Alphys and Undyne somehow. They knew absolutely nothing about her, aside from her working at the university and her claiming wanting to help. It was hard to believe, as there simply were no humans who truly only wanted to help. They always wanted something in return and usually the price was too high to pay. More gold, magical services, volunteering for science experiments or military service. Asgore had banned all experiments, military service and use of magic for and kind of gain for humans until they had equal rights with the humans in the country.

Papyrus was fussing about the food in the kitchen when the doorbell rang. Toriel asked him to watch the snail pie in the oven when she went to open the door. Sans heard a young woman’s voice. She sounded polite enough. Undyne and Alphys went to greet her. She hadn’t wanted a ride from them though. _figures._

Sans was still buried under his gloomy thoughts when she noticed how nervous Frisk was. Frisk didn’t trust humans generally. She didn’t talk about her past before Underground so it must’ve been bad and after the Barrier broke she has been slammed around when people tried to convince her that she’s being forced to be with the monsters or later they tried  to manipulate her to tell their secrets. She had to learn fast how to talk to media, only at age of 7. But now, she looked confused. Sans followed her gaze.

The woman looked normal, the same as all humans, really. But she didn’t try to decorate herself with fancy clothes, hair or makeup. She seemed taut, holding her hands together tightly, but she had a small, calm smile when she introduced herself with a quiet, gentle voice. When she said she was glad to be there, Sans finally realized to check her heart-shaped soul out. His eye lights widened. It… was not what he was expecting.

Sans had always been extraordinary at reading souls, which is why he got the gig of being the Judge in the Palace for humans that might’ve passed through. Normally monsters could see the other person’s soul and it’s color, maybe interpret it if an extremely strong emotion or Intent emanated out of it, giving them a chance at figuring out is the person dangerous. Sans could sense those things way clearer. Human souls were fascinating to him, even if most of the humans he had met were less than friendly. Monsters had white souls, where emotions and magic rippled as waves of colours. The first human he had met was Frisk and her soul was so red and bright, so powerful and warm, full of innocent Determination, it was a joy to watch at her soul. The rest of the humanity really let him down on that aspect. Other humans’ souls had different colours, but theirs tended to be duller, some sadly cracked, sometimes even dirtied and shriveled, emitting a large variety of emotions, most of them of the negative tone. This woman’s soul was a vivid dark blue, the traditional color of Integrity.

Sans couldn’t understand how he hadn’t sensed her all the way from outside the house already.

It was pulsating so strongly, so full of life, so full of emotion so that he could catch multiple separate ones that she was feeling. Usually he had to strain to feel even one properly. Mostly she felt anxiety, nervousness, uncertainty, agitation and worry. The emotions were so strong that Sans couldn’t understand, how was she standing so calmly and talking. This amount of anxiety would make a normal person have a screaming panic attack. Hell, it even hurt his soul as the negative emotions twirled over him. There was also still small, but steadily growing emotions of happiness, giddy, bubbling, unbelieving joy that built up more as she kept on interacting with the others. Her soul jolted with stinging anxiety every time she was hugged, but afterwards she felt happier than before the hug. But he could see something surrounding the soul, a dim, see-through sphere of sorts. It wasn’t blocking the soul to anyone else, that was for sure. Sans decided to make his presence known.

“so, is this the human i’ve been hearing about?”

She turned towards him. Her soul flared again. He sensed pure curiosity that was already there bloom inside her, but she wasn’t staring, she kept on smiling in that serene way. _how was she so calm?!_ Anyone that felt this curious would be shouting and touching their object of interest. Why was she feeling like _that_ , looking at _him_? Sans felt a blush creep on his cheekbones, but he didn’t let it manifest. She answered normally, with that same quiet, but kind voice.

“Hello, my name is Elisa. If by ‘this human’ you mean Alphys’ university office roommate, that would be me.”

“you guys share a room, huh? i hope you guys form a _staple_ working relationship. just make sure they don’t _bind’er_ with too much work.”

He ignored the others and looked at her expression and soul. Her face looked blank for a second and then she chuckled silently. Her anxiety weakened a bit and her happiness pulsated stronger and he felt some amusement in the mix. He wasn’t supposed to feel any of those fine changes and they were multiple meters apart, too!

“Oh! Those are office puns, right? Let me try.” She thought for a second and her soul emanated a strong pulse of playfulness. “I’m sure we will both be _glue'_ d to work!”

Unbelievably strong soul or not, she was the first human to answer with a pun to him. He chuckled.

“great, a person who appreciates puns. the _fax_ is, you’re the first human to visit Toriel just for lunch. I’m glad you share our sense of humor.”

“ _Supplies_!” … Such a strong pulse of giddiness and triumph radiated from her. He felt dizzy for a second, as the pulses washed over him. He started to laugh, both at the pun and because of her contagious happiness. Her curiosity jerked at that, but Sans didn’t notice what caused it.

Then however, his brother appeared from the kitchen. He seemed to be finally free from the snail pie watching duty and was his loud, passionate self. Elisa’s soul immediately reacted, her joy dampening and anxiety rising. Still she stood perfectly still as if there wasn’t a hurricane of emotions inside her, introduced herself and raised her hand. Papyrus however had other plans and he started quickly moving towards her for a hug.

Sans realized that she must be in a completely new situation, with that amount of anxiety. There was no resentment in her though and when she had calmed down she seemed to enjoy her stay. But a tall monster suddenly moving for her must’ve surely seemed extremely alarming. Sans stood up and tried to stop him, too late. Papyrus grabbed her into his arms. Sans almost fell on his knees over the agonizing emotions suddenly bursting out of her, biting back a cry.

Anxiety. Helplessness. Will to flee. Distress… and a growing, ominously sharp emotion of fear. It was drowning all the other emotions. His magic buzzed aggressively inside him and at his distal phalanges as his soul reacted to her emotions, his core preparing for a fight. He glanced at her soul and the color had started to change; from a corner of the soul it looked like a heavy red cloud of smoke was seeping into the rest of the soul, staining it from blue to purple to red. Sans had a feeling something bad would happen, if the fear kept on growing and her soul successfully turned red.

“ ** _bro_**. put her down.” He growled strongly, finally snapping Papyrus out of his mirth. He set her down and calmed his voice.

The human was tense, shaking, breathing shallow breaths with her eyes closed tightly. The fear was now stable, but her soul was still changing it’s color. He rushed next to her.

“hey, pal, it’s okay. you’re safe. you still here with us, buddy?”

He decided not to touch her, touching her too much had gotten her into this state. She opened her deep blue eyes, looking at him and the others, noticing their worry. He sensed a prickle of guilt from her. _why would she feel guilty…?_ She closed her eyes and seemed to prepare for something. Suddenly the dim, thin sphere around her soul thickened; it was as if millions of long needles were surrounding her soul. Her shaking stopped and she took a deep breath. The needles turned abruptly from transparent to red and her Intent rose. _intent for what?_ It felt like… nothing. No emotion whatsoever.

As soon as it started, it was over. Her soul was pure dark blue again, the sphere returned to being transparent and she stood there as if nothing had happened. Sans was sure the others had at least sensed her anxiety and noticed the color change of her soul, if not the seeping smoke and the sphere.

“... I’m sorry. I don’t meet new people that often and I’m jittery with loud noises and physical touches, especially with strangers. You did nothing wrong… Papyrus, was it?” She smiled gently.

… So. Did he seriously understand this right. She is overwhelmed by strangers, a different species one might add, almost torn apart by the strongest emotions he has ever felt _including his own_ and she feels guilty, apologising to them instead?? The others voiced their objections and apologies, but Sans just stared at her and her soul. She looked so serene. Her soul still gave out shivers of anxiety, but it’s as if all the flares of negativity were dampened down to the ground by a colossal boot. Now her soul throbbed slowly with the feeling of unnatural, eery calm. Finally, it clicked. The shpere wasn’t there to protect the soul from others. It was there for her to shield herself _from her own emotions_. Meaning she felt only a small fraction of them. But that was ridiculous, Sans thought. Damping one’s own emotions would mean that she felt numb most of the time. Why would she do that willingly? _and how?_

He managed to control his incredulous stare before she looked at him. Suddenly she smiled brightly, accepting Toriel’s offer of tea. The tangible tension released when everyone found something to do, leaving just him, Frisk and Elisa standing. _what will happen with her calm if i try to jolt it a bit…_

“sorry ‘bout my bro, he can be such a _bone_ head sometimes. good to see that you could calm down. the name’s sans, by the way.”

He raised his prank-ready hand, which she tried to shake. Fart sound filled the room. She looked blank for a second, her soul felt surprised. Suddenly, such a warm wave of relief and elation washed over him as she laughed for the first time. It was short and quiet, but pure and it sounded like windbells. Sans’ soul felt like it melted a bit from the combination of that amazing wave of pure happiness and her laughter. He wanted to hear more of it. He wanted to see what happy emotions he could make her feel. He caught himself thinking these mushy thoughts, slightly taken aback. _i've known her for 15 minutes, tops_. She wasn’t dangerous for now, her soul practically sung out what a harmless creature she was, but that globe- no, shield, kept on bothering him.

They sat down and Toriel brought the tea. She had probably used magic heated water and laced the tea with some soothing monster herb, because even though Elisa kept her composure, it seemed as if she relaxed and sunk into the sofa a bit. Sans sipped his own tea and pretended to look at the sweet bags which he couldn’t read anyways while sensing her soul. She seemed to relax more as she took a deep breath, her soul filled with even more calm and contentment. He started chatting with Toriel and Frisk, sometimes asking Elisa some simple questions, not wanting to burden her right now. She answered and commented politely from time to time, staying rather timid, seemingly lost in her own thoughts and focusing on her tea. She seemed to realize it calmed her.

Sans sat next to her during the lunch. Now that they were only few tens of centimeters apart, he could sense almost everything she felt. Now there was mostly curiosity and reserved anticipation. They started eating and she took her first bite. Her face stayed absolutely normal, apart from her lightly raising eyebrows.

Sans shivered and had to suddenly restrict himself from moaning out loud.

Elisa’s soul… it was shining like the sun to him, giving out a pulse like a detonating supernova. There were so many emotions jumbled together and they were boiling over. Surprise, amazement, disbelief, joy, euphoria… She couldn’t have felt all that just from a bite of meatloaf and potatoes. She couldn’t have stayed still like that with such an erupting volcano of emotions. _why wasn’t she a drooling, whining mess sprawled on the floor?_ But she did and congratulated Toriel perfectly calmly telling with many words how her food tasted outstanding and like nothing she had ever eaten before. Toriel blushed and explained that the food was cooked with fire magic, integrating it into the food to add more nourishment to monsters. It made the food taste better too, but not to present her with _that_ amount of emotion. She hummed and continued eating.

The emotions of her bliss continued their blaze, fluttering out only slightly tamer now. Sans used all his willpower not to tremble, blush or breathe funnily. _f-feeling like this is sorta, huh, too intimate for lunch table._ She seemed lost in thought again, watching nowhere in general. Added to the food-bliss there was also true happiness of her just being there, relaxed. Anxiety and worry were only a small fleck in the corner of her soul now. Lastly but definitely not the least, there was a steady, strong thrum of that burning curiosity that he had felt on him earlier. Again, she was acting completely modest, not staring or ogling at anything or anyone. Not asking questions, and humans _always_ asked the same questions. It was understandable, monsters were just so different from humans and especially monsters like Sans and his brother were always a target of awe to humans. He didn’t mind the questions much, they just sometimes tended to get too personal and the people asking them were rude and pushy. She didn’t ask any of them, only commenting on the discussion going on. No one is this patient with that turmoil of curiosity! She should’ve been spewing out questions like a machine gun!

Sans tried to concentrate on something else than her soul but it was incredibly hard. She was basically a lighthouse packed with the world’s biggest, loudest and also the most beautiful sounding orchestra located right next to him. He heard his brother start talking about his Friday’s work day with his loud, excited noise. Elisa didn’t seem uneasy around him anymore, which made Sans happy. He was also satisfied about how his brother loved his job. He had worked with Asgore as a gardener at the Monster School at first but he had this burning desire to finally do something with humans. No one would give him a job, though. His big size, booming voice and enthusiasm just chased all the humans away, until the amusement park founder saw the potential in him. Now, with his red, lavish costume he is essentially the icon of the amusement park. Sometimes people come to the front gates just to meet him. Man, his brother was so cool.

Sans turned his attention away from his brother when Elisa asked him, where he worked. Trying his best not to keep glancing at her soul in her chest, he told him about his night job as a guard. It was easy, it was unlikely that his powers were never really needed(they had made a silent agreement with his boss on staying silent of him using magic on the job, if it ever came to that) and like his brother said, he got plenty of napping breaks. He got to use his skill of sleeping anywhere and anyhow, in this case while standing. He asked her in return what did she do for work. He hadn’t indulged himself with human culture or science even though he had the time and access through human internet. He knew humans were squishy and got hurt and sick easily, but this cancer thing Elisa told about sounded pretty bad. He and Alphys listened with interest. She tried her best to explain shortly how humans were constructed from organic material and about her own research focusing on creating a fitting medicine for a certain type of cancer. She clearly had to dumb it down a lot since they didn’t know the words she used. Magical creatures had it easier, huh? He felt her soul radiating delight as she discussed her project with them, she clearly enjoyed her job and knew what she was doing. Finally they got to the topic which had brought her there in the first place; her wish to help.

“Like I told Alphys and Undyne yesterday, if any of you have any difficulties with paperwork, or have questions about humans, any kind really, I’d be more than glad to help.” He felt her uncertainty towards her skills.

“My child, it is very generous of you to offer your help and we don’t want to overburden you. But I will inform King Asgore about your offer in case he needs it. Humans have not made the integration of our species into the society easy.” Toriel sounded bitter, but Sans felt Elisa’s soul jolt brightly at the mention of the King.

“I’m not sure will my help be worthy to his Majesty, but I will do my best!”

Sans could detect liars if he was close enough and could focus on their souls. He had sensed nothing that showed her lying during the whole visit. She beamed such sure honesty, together with unbelieving, relentless excitement. Sans didn’t feel the same way and knew that Elisa couldn’t know the whole truth. Toriel didn’t want to interact with Asgore any more than it was necessary, which made sense, as he had killed the 6 human children she had tried to protect, after their own children had died. Nothing would fix their broken relationship. Sans felt no sympathy towards him either, he thinks Asgore should’ve calmed himself and thought it over for a better solution. They were all mere young children, like Frisk, whom he was also going to kill before Toriel stepped in. He deserved to be wallowing in guilt and buried in work.

The rest of the meeting continued calmly at the sofas, tasting the sweets Elisa had brought. He was surprised at how much he liked the tough, salty, black candies she had brought. Even though he threw puns at her, she gave him the whole bag and promised more, laughing. The wave of joy wasn’t any weaker than earlier and Sans just basked in it’s warmness. Papyrus, of course, was exasperated which he always found funny. He felt even happier when she retorted him, making Papyrus get even more riled up. When Papyrus invited her over, he didn’t say anything. He did want to meet this human again, _not only to marvel at her soul though!_ He wanted to keep an eye socket on her, trying to figure out what she was and how did she have such a peculiar power. Her soul stung a moment with concern, why? She said Sunday won’t do, but she’ll gladly come on Monday.

While they chatted, her bright soul started to dim, pulsing less joy. There were increasing undertones of tiredness, returning anxiety, unease and anticipation for something… bad? The  discomfort in her soul was increasing, as if her body was in pain. It only showed as her clasping her shaking hands so tight her knuckles were white. Otherwise she was smiling gently and chatting calmly. The undertones finally raised so strong that she seemed to decide to tell them that she needed to return to her cats. Again, she felt honest, but it still felt like she was hiding the real reason for leaving. She hugged everyone, clearly comfortable with it now, him too. She hugged so very gently. This was the closest they had been physically. Sans felt his breath hitch and his soul tremble.

 _Oh, gods_...

Their souls were only separated by their rib cages, her skin and some clothes. He felt her prickling uncomfort, but he was almost overwhelmed by the warmness of her soul, all the joy, kindness, delight, excitement, refreshing honesty and everburning curiosity. His joints were humming with restless magic and he had to focus on keeping himself upright, the euphoria that washed over him made him feel weak. He couldn’t stop a small, content sigh exit through his nasal cavity. _Why did it feel like his soul was going to forcefully manifest itself?_ He didn’t want to let go, it felt too good, but he forced himself to act his normal, relaxed act and hug her only shortly.

He looked at her leave with Undyne and Alphys. He realized that his soul felt oddly empty. As if his own emotions weren’t enough to fill it anymore. Not after experiencing her soul’s brilliance. He yearned for those waves of emotion again. He was shocked by himself again. _stars, when did i turn this squishy? she was here only for a couple of hours!!_ He forced the mushy feelings down, trying to rationalize the situation. A human had appeared with an incredibly strong emotion emission. Under distress her soul had started to change color, _souls just don’t do that_. Then she had forced her soul to return to original with that bizarre shield around her soul. Frisk  had confirmed that she could see the red smoke too, but no sphere. There’s no human medicine that can create such a thing. A dangerous thought crossed his mind. _could she use magic…?_ He asked the others inconspicuously, did they notice anything different about her soul. All of them were able to sense the very strongest pulses of her emotions, which was not common for an original monster. They had also noticed the color changes.

He now had multiple reasons to wait for Monday evening.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Doki doki (✪ฺܫ✪ฺ)


	4. Irony of Self Preservation

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing more migraine, punny texts and depressing inner monologue
> 
> Not the most exciting chapter, sorry for the puns
> 
> Chapter tags: Migraine
> 
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

Elisa woke up relatively calmly. She had missed her alarm, so it was almost midday. For the second night in a row she hadn’t woken up startled or screaming after nightmares she couldn’t remember, or from a _bothersome_ dream, or become aware being somewhere else than her bed. She should’ve been happy, but the yesterday's migraine came back to her in full force. She wasn’t shaking anymore, but she felt weak and her forehead was pounding, as if someone was hitting it with a heavy rubber sledgehammer every few seconds. Her room was dark apart from the sliver of light coming from her bedroom door. Even that amount of light hurt her eyes and half of her view was still blocked by zig zag auras. She popped a few pain killers with a glass of water from her night stand, even if they didn’t help much. She still had her clothing on from yesterday, so she dragged herself to her closet and put on simple but comfortable sweatpants and a t-shirt. After visiting the toilet she tended to her cats, keeping her eyes closed most of the time to protect them from the light. She felt bad for Hippa and Lievo, she hadn’t spent that much time with them lately. But today she had no energy for that either, all light, sound and movement just added more force into the swing of that sledgehammer. So she went back to the bedroom, carefully slumping on the bed. She checked her phone and grimaced at the brightness, turning it all the way down. She had multiple messages, she hadn’t checked her phone again yesterday. She just couldn’t manage. Even now it was funky trying to read the messages with the auras.

 **Toriel:** It was wonderful to have you here, Elisa! Your company was delightful. I meant what I said, you are welcome to visit anytime. I can also drive you if you need a ride, it’s not a problem. Frisk also wishes to say hello! ]:)

 **Toriel:** I have informed Asgore about your wish to help with human issues. He said he will contact you himself if he wishes to meet you, I gave him your phone number.

 **Alphys:** Are you working tomorrow? Wanna meet for lunch break somewhere? I don’t know the university restaurants yet and I don’t want to go alone...

 **Unknown number:** what’s brown and sticky?

She answered Toriel, thanking for her hospitality and kindness, that she was also very happy to visit and that she’d gladly come over again some time. She also thanked her for letting the King know and how she hoped she could assist him and all of them. It still felt surreal. _How could she possibly be of any help to the King of Monsters?_

She hesitated before answering to Alphys. Her migraines usually lasted one day and night, but there had been cases of multiple days before and she had had to take sick days. She answered her that she was unsure and would let her know on Monday morning. Now for the unknown number… She had an idea of who it might be.

 **Elisa:** I don’t know, what?

She closed her phone and her eyes, trying to rest for a while. She couldn’t even think about eating, or doing anything at all, really. All her limbs felt heavy. But she still planned to drink some tea at least and take a warm bath in a dark, silent bathroom. As she was about to get up, her phone vibrated.

 **Unknown number:** a stick. ;)

She smiled at that. The joke was simple and silly, but it was nice that someone joked especially with her.

 **Unknown number:** what type of art do skeletons like?

 **Elisa:** I don’t know, what type?

 **Unknown number:** _skull_ tures. ;P

She chuckled(and regretted it, _ow_ ). She supposed it was easy for him to make skeleton jokes. She knew a few jokes that she had happened to see online.

 **Elisa:** What’s the worst thing about throwing a party in space?

 **Unknown number:** dunno, what?

 **Elisa:** You have to _planet_!

It took a moment for him to answer.

 **Unknown number:** heh. good one. this is sans btw, if that wasn’t clear yet. paps gave me your number.

She saved the number. She however couldn't think of a good reason, why Papyrus would’ve given her number to him.

 **Elisa:** He gave it to you or you asked for it?

 **Sans:** you _see right through me_ ;) i asked for it. but yeah, i wanted to ask how are you feeling. you seemed a bit uneasy as you were leaving yesterday.

Elisa had tried to hide her starting headache and dizziness the best she could yesterday because she wanted to enjoy the company as long as possible. She supposed she wasn’t hiding it that well after all. She didn’t want him to worry, but didn’t see a proper reason not to tell him the truth.

 **Elisa:** I get migraines two or three times a month. I felt it starting after the lunch. It usually lasts only a day and night, but I wanted to make sure it’s gone before I visit you and Papyrus. That’s why I said I can’t visit today but on Monday instead.

Her phone gave a long vibration. Sans was calling.

_WhyishecallingmenobodycallsmeeverIcan’ttalkrightnowmyheadhurtswhatdoIdo_

She pressed the close call button and quickly texted him.

 **Elisa:** Sorry, I can’t answer. I’m very sensitive to all light, movement and noise right now, it would hurt. I hope you understand, can you text instead what you wanted to say?

There was no answer, so she pocketed the phone and slowly trailed into the kitchen to fill the water cooker and prepared herself a cup of green tea. The painkillers she took had started to ease the hammering slightly. Her phone vibrated in her pocket.

 **Sans:** i’m so sorry, didn’t know what migraine was. read about it quickly now though. you should’ve said something yesterday, maybe toriel could’ve helped, she has healing magic. can i do something to help?

Elisa was a bit bewildered by the whole situation. Why was he so worried about her? Maybe he was just shocked by the human sickness? They had talked in a friendly manner yesterday, even joked and laughed, but he had seemed reserved towards her during the whole visit. He was all tense when she had hugged him goodbye. Maybe he wasn’t a hugger, she knew she wasn’t(because she  had no one to hug) but everyone just was so... _huggy_ and she had felt happy and immersed with the feeling. She hadn’t even expected to meet him again until she heard he lives with Papyrus, who on the other hand was really excited to meet her again and she felt the same way. Papyrus’ enthusiasm and joyfulness just rubbed her the right way and his fervent chatting was fun to listen to. She felt ashamed of being so terrified of him the first time they met and was determined to set things right by him. She answered Sans.

 **Elisa:** I didn’t want to bother her or anyone. I have painkiller medicine that helps some. Please don’t worry about me, I just need rest. I will be feeling better tomorrow, I’m sure!

She started sipping her tea, when he answered.

 **Sans:** alright, but next time you feel uncomfortable or in pain, you don’t need to hide it. i’m sure none of us would feel bothered, we just want you to feel ok.

She smiled and her chest felt warm.

 **Elisa:** Thank you, Sans. I’ll keep that in mind. I’ll take a warm bath now, it should help too.

 **Sans:** don’t let me hold you, _water_ you waiting for ;)

Laughing(again, _ow_ ), she finished her tea, drew the bath and added some sandalwood oil into the water. She undressed, closed the door so that the room was pitch black and lowered herself into the warm water. After a while she felt her tense muscles relax and headache lessen. She stayed in the dark, silent, aromatic bath for a better part of an hour, massaging her shoulders, breathing the scent of the oil deeply, just thinking.

_Yesterday was so, so nice…_

Last time she had real friends was in fourth grade in Finland. Then... something... had happened, and her friends had just started to not see her anymore. She had been bullied, but after whatever it was that she couldn’t remember, the bullying stopped and everyone just… avoided her. As if afraid. Weird stories and rumors about her started to spread. She heard people calling her a freak when they thought she couldn’t hear. The loneliness it caused felt even worse than the bullying. When they moved to Ebott City, Scotland with her mother to her new job, she started high school. She had had a few people she might’ve called friends, but she never got too close to them. They were usually chased away anyways, since she didn’t fit the role of a normal teenager. She wasn't interested in fashion, looks or boys, nor had the sense to pretend. She was an introvert book nerd already back then. She couldn’t go to parties or big, loud gatherings because of her anxiety and sometimes she would be away for longer times because of her migraine. Sometimes she was so heavily drugged just so she could cope in school that it changed her whole personality into an unresponsive recluse. No wonder people weren’t keen on trying to keep her company.

Same thing continued in university. She had been in various different therapies throughout the years but she she stopped visiting them after another incident she can’t remember. The therapist had promised not to inform the cops, about what she didn’t say, but asked her to never come again. She learned to numb her emotions after the final serious incident a few years ago, when she thought she’d give dating a chance for the first time. She had never felt interest in romance or being intimate with another person, so when a guy asked her out she thought, maybe she needed a so-called jump start. She didn’t remember anything about the date, waking up the next day at home. She found out she had done... something, and the guy had ended up in a hospital, refusing to meet her.

She knew something happened if she got too afraid or angry. She’d become aware of being somewhere else than a while ago, much later, and she had done something violent or otherwise regrettable. It wasn't very comforting, suddenly becoming aware somewhere completely else with hurting fists, bruises, or even stained clothes with blood that wasn't hers. It was a miracle that she didn’t have a crime record. She had learned to recognize the feeling of losing control. So she made sure she wouldn’t feel those feelings, or any other ones that might contribute to their awakening, ever again. After years of training her mind, she’d succeeded to mostly feel calm numbness in most situations. While she still had memory loss from time to time, it was nothing too serious. She could focus on work and keep herself busy by exhausting her body with exercise till she couldn't move and by reading and filling her head with any information until she hopefully had no time or space in her head to think about anything upsetting. She could function in the society. And that was enough. _Or so she had thought._

They had seen first-hand how she could crumble from a simple hug. She knew they had noticed, from their worried faces, even though she had tried to hide it. But they hadn’t turned away. Instead, they had invited her again, saying they enjoyed her company and she had felt happier than she had truly ever been. Even if it was only a few hours. It felt ironic. After learning for years how to exist alone without emotions, she yearned for them and for friends more than ever. Could she risk them knowing how messed up she was, or could she keep herself in one piece while still enjoying their company? What would she do when they found out and would finally leave her? She shuddered at the thought, but she knew that she was tired of being truly lonely. Sure, she had her cats, her mother and some work acquaintances that she met from time to time at the university for coffee and she felt peaceful and comfortable in her house by herself most of the time. But after she had forced herself to calm down yesterday, the happy emotions filling her had been so… It’s like she had a fresh breath of air after years of stagnant smog. She wanted more. And for that, she needed to train.

Feeling a bit better, she scrubbed herself and got out of the bath. The headache felt like a small rubber hammer now, which was still bad, but a huge improvement. The aura was almost gone. She risked eating a few sandwiches as her nausea had decreased. She gently played with her cats and pet them for a while before going back to the dark bedroom. She settled on the floor cross-legged on a small pillow.

Her focused meditation lasted for the rest of the day.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> She deserves better... right?


	5. Agony and Relief

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing sassy Sans, lack of sense of privacy and FEELS
> 
> Chapter tags: Migraine
> 
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

Sans had nothing to do while he was at home on Monday midday, mindlessly surfing TV channels. Human sport, human news, human soap opera, human advertisement, nature documentary… Okay, this one didn’t have humans in it. He was starting to miss MTTV _but he was definitely not going to admit that to anyone_. At least then there would be more monsters on the television, even if 90% of the time it was Mettaton and his obnoxious voice. He would rather watch one of Mettaton’s tens of movies instead of watching something with humans right now. Every human reminded him of her. He saw the same facial expressions as she had made, even if she always restricted hers. And then he would remember what she had felt when she had made that face, he’d try to remember how it had felt when the emotion had hit his soul, how it made it react, how he had almost lost his composure at times, how good it had felt to be closer and closer to her soul, how he had wished to-

_okay, this is getting just ridiculous._

He decided to go out for a walk. There were humans too, but maybe he could relax looking at the sky in the park. Even after 3 years, he had never gotten tired of just staring at the sky, no matter what weather. It was so vast, so endless, changing every day. It truly was the symbol of freedom to him and he wouldn’t go a day without seeing the sky at least once. He sat down next to a tree, it’s leaves already turning yellow, leaning against it and gazing up. The sky was blue with few clouds swimming across slowly. _blue like her eyes were- dammit_. He sighed, as his thoughts wandered to yesterday. He was happy when she had answered his texts - _though talking face to face would’ve been much better, he could’ve felt her soul- agh, stop!_ \- she even sent him a pun back. A space pun, too. When she said she had something called migraine, he had called her without thinking, wanting to ask what it meant and why it had made her soul feel so uncomfortable. Well he wouldn’t have mentioned the soul, obviously.

But she had hung up. He had suddenly felt embarrassed, confused, sad and hurt at the same time. Why did he call her? They had only met for a few hours. Why did she hang up, she didn’t actually want to speak to him? And why would she answer, they had indeed only met for a few hours?! While fighting with himself in his head, he had received her message, telling that she couldn’t talk since it would hurt. She was in pain. His eye sockets had widened at that and he went to his computer. Using human internet he had searched what migraine meant. He grew more shocked as he read. _Mild to severe headaches, lasting from 2 to 72 hours, symptoms including nausea, vomiting, sensitivity to light, sound, movement or smell, sight-blocking auras…_ Had she been feeling pain ever since she left on Saturday? AND she had this thing maybe 3 times a month?!

He had apologised and wrote his concerns, asking if he could help. He had wanted to do something, anything. He remembered the ugly, uncomfortable feeling that was thrumming from her soul, how she had gotten more and more fidgety as the feeling got stronger. He had felt a bit frustrated, she should’ve said something. But she answered. She hadn’t wanted to bother anyone, she had painkillers(though he had read that those don’t always help) and she didn’t want him to worry. He wanted to make sure she understands that she doesn’t need to hide it if she ever feels bad. He almost wrote that _he_ wouldn’t feel bothered and that _he_ wanted her to feel ok, changing it to us and we before sending. Her thank-you felt sincere and warmed his soul. He punned at her bath comment and had to leave it at that. She didn’t write to him anymore that evening, though. Maybe she was resting, as she was supposed to.

He was lost in his thoughts when he felt his pocket vibrate with a jingle. There was a message.

 **Elisa:** I’m really sorry Sans, I think I won’t be able to make it today either. I wrote Papyrus a message too. I hate breaking promises, I promise I will come tomorrow!

 _oh_ **_hell_ ** _no._

He found Toriel’s number and called. Luckily, she answered. “Hello, Sans?”

“yeah t it’s me. are you free? elisa, the human from saturday, has this thing called migraine and she’s in pain. can you try and heal her, like, now?” He tried to not sound hasty.

“Oh my! Well, my lectures for today just ended and I only have paperwork. I can come."

“k, just a sec-” He took a shortcut right into her office in the Monster School on the other side of the city. She was so used to him just popping into existence out of nowhere, so she just smiled as he closed the call. “wait, I’ll call undyne for her address.”

He did. And coincidence or not, she and Alphys were just about to leave the university to go to Elisa's place. Elisa had texted Alphys in the morning apologising that she can’t come to work and she would have to spend her lunch time alone. Alphys had asked Undyne could they go check on her during the said lunch break with her car.

“you guys are at the university? gate c? k, t, grab my hand-” Toriel took his hand as they shortcutted to the said gate, where Alphys and Undyne with her phone still on his ear fin were standing next to her car. They both jumped a bit, Undyne screamed and had to catch the phone she had set flying. Sans hadn’t shown this particular ability Underground to many monsters and they were still getting used to him bobbing in and out of existence.

“What the hell, Sans?! You could’ve given a warning or someth-”

“i’m sorry. let’s go? i would’ve gone there myself already but i haven’t been there before.” He came out a bit irritated, he knew but his patience was running low. Undyne shut her trap fortunately and they got into her car. The drive took only a few minutes, before they were at her apartment. Sans distractedly noticed that it was part of red 1-story row houses with small front yards, located in the suburbs close to the university in a peaceful area. Her blue bike was locked in between some large berry bush and her front door. They all gathered at her door and Undyne rang the doorbell.

It felt like an eternity before there were noises behind the door. He had started to seek for the feeling of her soul already when he stepped on the front yard, sensing it faintly. _she's like a homing beacon..._ He thought he was prepared this time. He had been developing a magical barrier in front of his soul in hopes of it dampening her emotions. He didn’t really want to dampen them but if he wanted to get anything done while spending time in near proximity with her, he had to figure out something. He would be too distracted otherwise. The feeling of her soul got stronger as she was behind the door and when she opened it slowly-

Sans almost grimaced. The shoddy barrier he’d created shattered promptly and his knees threatened to buckle. He faintly felt her confusion, surprise, joy and anxiety that he sadly recognized to always be there, but he was nearly overwhelmed by the throbbing, burning agony screeching over his soul. Her soul looked much duller than usually and it trembled somewhat. Usually physical pain wasn’t projected through the soul. However, if the pain was strong and/or sustained for a long time, it could manifest in the soul, emanating through it and changing it’s appearance. She was in a lot of pain and had been for a long time. Sans recognized this feeling from his youth. _Pictures and smells of the laboratory flashed in his mind._ He never wanted to feel it again, even less through her. The shield looked different too, stronger. It was thicker and there were millions of very short needles around the soul all the time now. It was another thing he needed to worry about later.

“Oh, my child… Sans said you were in pain, but _what in the name of the forefathers has happened to you_?”

Sans realized he had been staring at the soul in her chest the whole time and tore his gaze up. There were dark circles under her eyes and she was even paler than before, her skin glossy from sweat. It seemed that she hadn’t eaten or slept properly. She tried to look normal and calm, failing miserably. Her posture was limp and she was squinting her eyes. Her voice was silent and frail.

“He said what- wuh-wait, why are you all here? Don’t you have work? Queen Toriel, I didn’t want to bother any of y-” She whimpered silently, closing her eyes and holding her forehead with a shaky hand. He felt her agony pulsate excruciatingly.

“elisa, we came to help. undyne and alphys came too since they were worried. can we come in so it will be darker? the daylight must hurt your eyes.” He tried to keep his voice steady and quieter than usual. The others looked at her. “strong light, voices, smells and moving causes her headache to worsen, i read it online.” He muttered.

“Uh, yeah, o-okay, please do come in…” she shuffled into the dimmed living room. Toriel guided her to sit down on the sofa. Sans glanced around.

The white living room had a coat rack, a small entryway table, a sofa in front of a TV, a computer table, a tall construction of towers and fluffy platforms for her cats he supposed and a big bookshelf filled to the brim with books. A kitchen was connected to the living room, separated by a table top with shelves on top of it, filled with ingredients and glasses. There were two other doors, presumably to a bedroom and a bathroom. There were no decorations nor pictures. There were two long-haired cats looking at them from the entrance of the kitchen, one with grey fur with a white front and paws and blue eyes, the other one had all pitch black fur and yellow eyes. Sans looked back at Elisa, who was now sitting and looking pained at Toriel.

“W-What are you-”

“I’m going to try if I can heal your headache. I need to first get a feeling of it. Stay still, okay?” Toriel placed her hands on the sides of Elisa’s head. She looked alarmed, her mask all gone. He felt it from her soul too, under all the agony.

“P-Please no, Toriel, I don’t want you to get hurt! I-” She gasped, closing her eyes as Toriel closed her own. Her hands glowed with a faint green colour. Elisa’s mouth opened slightly and Toriel’s eyebrows scrunched together. Her eyes were moving under her eyelids, as if she was searching for something.

“Don’t worry my child, I cannot feel it directly. But I can sense how much pain there is. I’m trying to locate the source, there’s just so much, why did you not tell us earlier, my dear? You made Sans worry and- ah, found it. Hold on.” The green glow of her hands got stronger and Elisa’s back arched while she sucked in a harried breath of air, shivering. The agony disappeared suddenly and for a moment it seemed that her poor soul was just too shocked to feel anything. Toriel opened her eyes and took her hands away, setting one on her shoulder gently.

It looked like her blue soul abruptly set ablaze.

Sans leaned against the wall. He had to, or he would’ve slumped on the floor. Her soul filled with relief, unbelief, comfort and pure bliss, surging these emotions aggressively and continuously outwards into all directions, through his soul, through his bones, making them hum. He felt like something was elevating him towards the sun that shone it’s warm rays just for him. Her soul was shining brighter than ever before, hurting his eyes. He couldn’t stop a small groan, his eyelids closed halfway, eye lights large and he was breathing heavily. His face was fully flushed and his joints were humming and glowing faint cyan. _this feels too amazing, it shouldn’t, i should stop this somehow, but, oh s-stars..._

“There we go! Healing takes the most toll on the person being healed, so I can cook you something to eat so you replenish your strength faster and- Oh, my child…”

She was crying.

Sans sobered up a bit with that sight, managing to straighten up, willing his deep cyan blush away and return his joints to normal. She didn’t feel embarrassed when Toriel hugged her and she grabbed her almost desperately, weeping softly into her shoulder. He knew she was crying tears of joy and relief, but it was still hard to watch. He looked at Undyne and Alphys, who both seemed perplexed, affected by her soul’s intensity. The emotion was rather intimate especially when it pulsed out so strongly, so it must’ve made them feel uncomfortable, as if they weren’t supposed to be there. Sans felt the same way, but he didn’t want to budge anywhere from this glorious soul. The selfish part of him just wanted to set camp right next to her soul and stay in the radiance forever. He felt even hungrier for it than on Saturday.

“do you guys wanna go back to work? i can take toriel back to the school once we’re done.”

“Uh, yeah… Elisa, I hope you’re feeling better-”

“Sweetie I t-think she can’t hear y-you. Let’s j-just go, we can talk w-with her later.” Undyne looked at Alphys softly and glanced back to Elisa, still clutching to Toriel, shivering.

“... Yeah.”

They left silently and Sans started to feel a bit awkward. He still felt like he was about to come undone under the strong pulses of her bliss, but he could control himself better now. He managed to manifest some sort of a feeble barrier, immediately mourning the dampened feeling of her soul, wanting to get rid of the barrier permanently. But now he could think clearer instead of drudging through a haze of pure euphoria.

Elisa was slowly calming down, coming down from her high of _not pain_ , still sniffling slightly. Toriel was also sitting down on the sofa now still holding her, gently rubbing her back. Elisa finally let her go, looking shy.

“T-thank you.” She whispered.

“You are very welcome. Whenever you feel pained again, don’t hesitate to call me, I will come as soon as I can. Now, shall we see about that food? You really need eat or you’ll feel even worse than before.”

Elisa nodded, so Toriel got up and wandered into the kitchen. Elisa’s soul calmed down, now feeling relaxed, still unbelieving, bashful and exhausted. But happiness was still pulsing strongly within her. Sans jumped a bit when she turned to look at him, still standing at the door. The feelings of curiosity and confusion were added in her soul and also showed on her face. The shield around her soul was barely visible, it seemed like she had completely forgotten to ward herself. Sans started when she stood up and began walking towards him. He tried to seem relaxed and scratched his cheek bone with a digit.

“uh, sorry we just appeared like that. i got your message and, uh, thought we could at least try if she could help and-”

She hugged him tight.

Her soul radiated such warm gratitude which enveloped his soul, rushing through it. If his shield wasn’t up, he was sure he would’ve let out the most embarrassing whimper. He tried to hug her back without shivering.

“Thank you.” She whispered into his shoulder hoarsely. “Truly, I… I never expected anything like this- no, I actually expected nothing. Nobody has done anything remotely this kind to me.” The honesty of her soul hurt him, now. He hugged her a bit tighter.

“i told ya, didn’t i? we just want you to be ok and we want to help.” he murmured.

The closeness of her soul felt like hell and heaven, he couldn’t decide did he want to hug her impossibly closer or let go. She made the decision for him, letting him go, sniffing a bit. She was still holding his bony shoulders when she was suddenly smiling a wide, bright smile. His hands on her shoulder blades twitched a bit.

“I’m going to go clean myself up. Make yourself at home, alright? Oh, and can you write Papyrus that he can ignore my message? I’m totally coming over now!” She gave a small giggle and walked to bathroom, he guessed. When the feeling of her soul weakened and no one was looking, he slumped to sit on the floor leaning against the door, closing his eyes, covering his face with his hands. If he had a heart, it would be beating it’s way out of his rib cage right now. He groaned and tried to level his suddenly gasping breathing.

“oh, gods… this shit is _intense_.”

“So I suppose there is much more to her than what we can sense, Sans?” Toriel’s voice was soft.

Sans hadn’t realized how long he was just sitting there looking extremely distraught, rubbing his skull. He jerked upright, a bit stunned while Toriel was standing in front of him. He heard some pot boiling on the stove.

“w-what do you mean?”

“I know you were appointed the Judge back in the Underground, Sans. Your skills at sensing souls must be on another level compared to other monsters. I felt her agony and relief now, and I felt some of her stronger emotions on Saturday. I’ve never felt emotions from another person without touching their… their souls.” She admitted.

Sans’ browbones burrowed at that. Was Elisa’s soul really that exceptionally strong, or why did he sense her so accurately?

“What do you sense from her?”

He _really_ didn’t want to tell her. But he had to tell someone, this was too big a matter to keep all to himself.

“... at close distance, i can sense almost all of her emotions at their full power. it’s…” He gulped, looking away.

Elisa’s soul is the best thing he had ever experienced. He yearned to be closer to her even now. But he decided to leave his own feelings out of this and to be serious with her. He turned to Toriel again.

“her soul is, heh, _sans_ ational, it’s overwhelming my senses and i’ve had to create a shield for my soul to keep thinking properly. she also has a peculiar shield around her own soul and it seems it is dampening her own emotions from herself. i saw it in action after paps hugged her. you saw the color change. it felt like something was going to happen if the color change completed, but she _consciously stopped and reversed it_. i don’t think she is dangerous, but i want to keep an eye socket on her. if there’s a possibility that she can use magic, we shouldn’t tell asgore about her, at least not yet.”

Toriel looked alarmed and somewhat guilty.

“Unfortunately I already told him about her, but only as a nice human who wishes to help… He said he’d contact her.”

Sans growled. He’d have to warn her. But Asgore might feel her emotions too… How much should he tell her about her abilities?

They stopped talking when Elisa got out of the bathroom in new, comfy clothes, looking refreshed. She had apparently taken a shower, her hair was damp and her face and neck were red, but it wasn't a blush. The redness looked kind of endearing. Sans relished her proximity. He moved to the kitchen divider and sat on a bar stool, while Elisa started helping Toriel in the kitchen. Toriel had found ingredients for a simple soup, which she was simmering on the stove with her own fire magic licking the pot's sides. Elisa looked at it, openly curious.

“how come you haven’t asked anything about us monsters?” Sans dared to finally ask. She looked forward, not really seeing what’s there.

“I… haven’t wanted to be rude. I wouldn’t ask such personal questions from a human.”

“but aren’t you curiou-”

“I can cite over three hundred questions off the top of my head. Yes Sans, I am curious. That doesn’t mean I’m tactless.” She smiled that gentle smile of hers. “I’ll ask my questions with time, but I just want to get to know you as persons first. If you’ll let me.”

The fresh wave of honesty hit him. _how does a person like this even exist?_

“Elisa, you are our friend now, even if we have known each other for such a short time. I can tell that you are a kindhearted person. You can ask any questions you want, whenever you want."

Elisa sputtered, her soul feeling bewildered. One of her cats meowed at that point. The other one was rubbing against Sans’ fibula.

“what’s wrong, _cat got your tongue?_ ”

She laughed, her soul resonating it beautifully. “I… I haven’t had friends in a very, very long time. Just my mother and my cats. There’s many things about me I don’t wish to share, which is why I respected your privacy by not asking anything in the first place. I wish you understand, that it’s very hard for me to open up to anyone.” She seemed more and more fuddled with herself as she talked, but the words just flowed out. _damn, that healing magic really shook her to the core, huh._

“No one is going to force you to talk about anything. You only talk if you wish and when you wish. Now, eat this.” Toriel quenched her magic and offered the soup to Elisa to eat.

“I don’t have anything proper to offer to you-” Toriel interrupted her. “Please, we were going to only visit you shortly. I need to return to the school now, Sans will take me.”

“yeah, uh, how about you eat and rest for a few hours? wouldn’t want you to _hit the sack_ during the dinner. or do you still want to meet tomorrow?” Sans asked, worried. “i’m sure paps would unders-”

“I’m coming. Please, you all came here for me. It’s the very least I can do.”

“k, if you’re sure… i’ll pick you up in the evening.”

“Great!” She flashed that bright smile again with contentment in her soul.

They left her to rest after giving her a hug( _gods, i could stay like this all day- no, bad sans!)_ and Sans took Toriel back to the school, finally shortcutting back home. Five short cuts in such a short time made him feel drained. _Or then it was the massive, incredible emotions washing over his soul that had left him drained_. Maybe both. He remembered finally to text Papyrus to not worry about Elisa, that he had taken care of it and she would still come over tonight.

Dazed, he almost floated in the air while walking to his bedroom. As he had thought, his soul mourned the emptiness. It wished to be filled again with Elisa’s concentrated emotions, letting them wash through him. It fluttered from the memory of the earlier bliss. It had been too much, it felt like he could’ve burst. But damn him if he didn’t want to feel it again. The power of her soul was enough to make him forget everything else, his past, all the atrocities he had committed, the hateful humans.

 

He crashed on his bed, turning to watch the ceiling. Evening felt like such a long distance away and now there was no chance that he could stop thinking about her soul.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we still even haven’t tasted the Great Papyrus’ spaghetti yet!


	6. Back to the Beginning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing flashback to migraineland, bone puns and... The moment the spaghettisexuals have been waiting for! The first taste of euphoria! Teehee (▼∀▼)
> 
>  Chapter tags: migraine, healing, spaghetti madness, lying
> 
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

Elisa doesn’t remember the last time she has truly cried. Besides from her amnesia episodes she presumed to have a good memory.

She hasn’t been allowed to be truly afraid or angry. She couldn’t remember those situations. She has never been so happy that she’d cry. Nothing in her life had made her overly happy. No surprise parties, no love confessions, no friends who’d tell her they cared. Her mother had her own, painful past which she had never recovered from and they were never truly close. Movies or books don’t have that effect on her, they don’t make her feel any extraordinary emotions. She didn’t know was it her illnesses’, her medications’ or her own fault. There’s been countless moments where she had felt confused, desperate, hopeless and incredibly sad but even with those emotions she had felt numb. And now for over four years she had predominantly felt numb. She realized she had just merely been existing, flowing indifferently through the stream of life, not caring, how the stream threw her around, not caring, long long she would float along... Not caring, if she would sink.

She had accepted what her day would be like on the early Monday morning. Her meditation went well on Sunday, she had felt her resolve and control strengthen. She’d be able to control herself better now. She could not falter anymore, she didn’t have a choice if she wanted to keep her company. _They could not see what she really was. They’d leave her for sure._ But seemingly her migraine had decided to stay for a while longer. It was worse than on Saturday and Sunday combined. This amount of pain was rare and she hadn’t felt it for years. She called in sick and wrote Alphys, apologising how she can’t take her to lunch. Painkillers didn’t work. For hours she was hoping, wishing that it will soon ease up, that she could still keep her promise to Papyrus. But as the seconds, minutes and hours dredged by and she had been spasming her muscles on her bed, exhausted, covered in sweat, dry heaving as she had nothing in her to puke out anymore, whining and writhing in soaring pain, she had to write both Sans and Papyrus that she couldn’t make it today. She’d make it tomorrow. She had to.

A short while later however, her doorbell rang, buzzing painfully in her head. She lugged herself to the door. The last thing she had expected to see were Undyne, Alphys, Toriel and Sans. Not that she saw them very well, the sun was burning her eyes and the auras were taking most of her vision now. The wind in the trees sounded like explosions. She could barely form coherent words, as she was already being led to sit on the sofa. Toriel had her furry hands on the sides of her head, saying she will need to get a feel for her pain. Elisa didn’t want this! No one else was supposed to suffer, it was her burden! But her objections fell short, when she felt Toriel _in her head_. The pain was still there, but it felt like her soothing presence was gliding in her consciousness, scanning the parts of her responsible for the operation of her body. Toriel said something but she didn’t hear, she felt her presence nudge something in the back of her mind and the presence intensified hundredfold. It felt like molten ice was poured in all of her nervous system, making her gasp and her whole body convulse. But the feeling was rapid and the pain was no more.

_The pain is gone_

_The nausea is gone_

_The auras are gone_

_The world is calm and silent, light and noise doesn’t hurt anymore_

_Muscles are weak but relaxed_

 

 _The_ _pain_ _is_ _gone_

 

Usually after a migraine passed, all she felt was exhaustion. But now she was filled with overwhelming relief. It felt better than any drug she had tried during her experimental stage, trying to find something, anything to both numb her and make her feel content. She didn’t feel the tears on her cheeks as she grabbed Toriel and wailed. She just held on and let the emotion ravage through her. She didn’t know good emotions this strong existed. The stream had dropped her through a waterfall into a vast lake of rapture. She cried out the years of pent up sadness, loneliness and pain, absorbing the comfort, joy and peace she felt. It felt like all her inner channels were opened up wide, flooding with all the good and bad, after years of being rusted shut, tightly guarded. Slowly, after what it felt like was years, she started to calm down and acknowledged that she was still clutching on Toriel, her fingers cramped. Toriel hadn’t let go of her, rubbing her back soothingly, letting her let go first. She didn’t know what to say. There were no words, no actions, nothing she could’ve done to repay what Toriel had done to her. She muttered the most sincere thank you she could and let her go make her food. She was suddenly exhausted and famished, but in a good way? Like she had won in a marathon. She realized Undyne and Alphys weren’t there anymore, but Sans was leaning against the door, looking at her. He flinched when she turned to him. His eye lights were large and bright, he had an odd expression that she couldn’t interpret.

_He had brought her. It’s because of him that I’m better. I didn’t ask for help, but he brought it anyways._

She rushed to him, not noticing how he tried to act or what he said, pulling him into a tight embrace. She didn’t feel or care about how tough his bones felt. He may not have healed her, but he cared about her, more than anyone ever had. Nobody she knew would’ve rushed to her because of a text message that informed them about a delay. No one else would’ve understood the reason behind the message. He hugged her back and she realized she didn’t want to let go. Or for him to let go of her. Again, it felt like her thank you was nowhere enough, she couldn’t even comprehend what she would need to do to feel that her gratitude was paid off. She tried to explain herself, what they had done to her, which just made him hug her tighter, reminding her of what he had texted to her on Sunday. Even with his hard edges he felt so good, so safe. She held on for a while longer before letting go, resolved to at least hold on to her original promise. Sans’ grin was kind and she smiled back so that her cheeks hurt. Sans’ hands twitched on her shoulder blades, his eyes were still wide and his cheekbones were lightly stained with cyan. Is that his blush, why would he be blushing?

She went to shower, after asking Sans to inform Papyrus she was still coming over tonight. She was so uncharasterically jubilant but she couldn’t care less at that moment. She took a cold shower, reinvirogating her slightly from her magical healing exhaustion. _I was healed! With magic!!!_ It was mind-boggling. Impossibility, would’ve been considered a _miracle_ really, before the monsters came to the surface. Her curiosity knew no bounds and she had even more questions. How did Toriel know what she was doing, would there be side effects even though she felt amazing right now, was her migraine completely cured now, could she always truly ask Toriel for help, did it drain her, how did it work, where did the energy come from, what was the science behind it, could it be explained with human science, would they be able to research it and have their own as they supposedly had a millenium ago-

She realized these were some very, very dangerous questions. Most of the humankind still clearly hated the monsters, because they were something unexpected and so to be feared, changing all their variables. And humans were the ones to seal them away in the first place with their magic. Elisa winced when she remembered Asgore’s biggest announcement. _Monsters were not allowed to use magic for humans’ gain before they both have equal rights_. Oh god, had she made Toriel break the law? But she had come willingly to her, saying she will always heal her if need be. It must be okay with her then, maybe because she is or was the Queen? Elisa decided to ask her later to make sure.

She got back into the living room, finding Sans and Toriel talking. Something smelled good in the kitchen. It was a simple chicken noodle soup package, but the aroma was deeper somehow. There were silent, orangey, transparent flames slowly licking the sides of the pot on the stove. It was fascinating. Sans maybe noticed her watching the flames and asked how come she didn’t ask anything. She remembered the dangerous questions in the shower and ensured him that even if she was curious, she’d rather get to know them just as people without delving to their privacy. She was speechless when Toriel said she was their friend now and she could ask anything she wanted.

_I have friends now. I am their friend, too._

The thought warmed her insides. She blurted out her insecurities, which Toriel gently took and assured her she wasn’t forced to say or do anything. They bid their goodbyes with hugs and Elisa started eating the soup. The _idea_ of the original soup was still there, but the taste was completely reconstructed. Simply said, it was delicious. She immediately felt sated, both body and mind. Was it only Toriel’s magic that was this potent, or the other monster’s too?

_______________________

After eating she still felt cheerful and decided to finally spend some quality time with her cats. She ran around the apartment laughing with a piece of a string, them chasing her. She brushed them both and tended to their other needs. She changed her sweaty bed sheets and did the laundry. In the end she had cleaned the whole apartment from top to bottom without realizing it. She was still buzzing with positive energy. _Wonder if Toriel could bake some magical energy bars or something…_ Her pocket was vibrating.

 **Sans:** i’m on my way, will only take a _mew_ ment

Ah… Her cats had opened yet another area to pun about. She waited at the front window, finally seeing a red convertible that she had seen in front of Toriel’s villa. That must be Sans. She still felt giddy and too energetic for her own good, so she decided to do something silly. If Sans liked puns, maybe he’d liked other silly things?

She grabbed a salmiakki candy bag from the cupboard and got out. Sans got out of the car, so she threw the bag to him, shouting “Catch this!”. As he catched the bag, she made sure her smaller items stayed in her pockets and put her hands on the ground and lifted her body effortlessly. It’s how she had been working out her upper body after all. She started ‘walking’ with her hands towards the car, with her legs flailing around slightly. Sans was laughing loudly with his baritone voice. He was grinning widely and had an amused and incredulous face. She grinned too, finally setting her legs down and standing upright, wiping her hands on her pants. Even that didn’t do much to her overflowing energy.

“Did I surprise you?”

“yeah, but i don’t want you breakin’ any bones. i don’t wanna hear anything else _crack_ ing than jokes and smiles, ok?”

“Alright. I’m not a joker, but I guess I’ll try to be a bit more _humerus_.”

“see, you got the hang of it already. It’s not hard _tibia_ comedian, y’know.”

“ _Patella_ the truth, I think I’m pretty _marrow_ -minded when it comes to jokes…”

“non _sans_. c’mon, we can keep on punning in the car. paps is waitin’ for ya.”

He thanked for the sweets and they drove a very punny 30 minute ride to the other side of the city, parking in front of a simple, grey apartment complex, located near Miracle Mountain, where Papyrus worked. He told him that the car was actually Papyrus’, as his old bed back in Snowdin, a town in the Underground, was shaped like one. It was one of the first things he had bought once they could turn their gold to human currency, even though he couldn’t even start learning how to drive it, since they didn’t have any rights yet back then. It was hard enough to buy the car, Sans had to convince them that it’s not a good idea to raise the price(he didn’t tell her how he did it) and they needed someone to drive the car through the fence control for them.

They got to their apartment in the 2nd floor and Sans opened the door. Elisa didn’t get to take a look around as Papyrus, today clothedwearing a red pullover, was already running from assumably the kitchen( _why did something smell burned_ ) stopping in front of her, hesitant.

“Oh, come here, Papyrus!” Elisa grinned, raising her arms. Papyrus squealed and grabbed her into a hug similar to the one on Saturday, but now she hugged back, both of them laughing gleefully. He set her down and let out a few ‘NYEH’s.

“OH I AM SO GLAD THAT YOU WERE ABLE TO COME! I WAS WORRIED YOU HAD SECONDS THOUGHTS BECAUSE OF WHAT HAPPENED ON SATURDAY.” He looked sad at the second phrase. She needed to fix that, immediately.

“Oh not at all! I was feeling unwell but Sans brought Toriel and they helped me. I’m still sorry about how I reacted before the lunch, I know now that you’re a great guy.”

“the coolest, even.”

“NYEHEH, I AM HAPPY THAT YOU THINK SO. EITHER WAY, I WISH YOU ACCEPT MY APOLOGY SPAGHETTI! I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, WISH TO WELCOME YOU TO OUR HUMBLE ABODE!!”

They got in and humble it was. It was similar to Elisa’s apartment, simple furnishing with an added dining table and one extra bedroom, but instead of a bookcase there were pictures on the walls and other decorations. There were multiple framed pictures presenting different monsters and Elisa recognized Toriel, Alphys and Undyne in many of them. Quite a few were selfies of Papyrus. There was a large poster of a cartoon-like bone on top of the TV. On a table there was rock in a cardboard box, covered in sprinkles. Everything was organized and squeaky clean, except for one single white sock in a corner that was covered and surrounded by Post-it stamps.

“SO SANS CAME FOR YOUR RESCUE WITH QUEEN TORIEL, EH? I’M GLAD TO SEE HE IS UP AND ABOUT, DOING THINGS, INSTEAD OF JUST SNOOZING ON THE COUCH!!”

“hey bro, i don’t always just snooze on the couch. sometimes i manage to sleep the whole day on it.”

“UGH, YES, I HAVE SEEN YOU IN THE EXACT SAME POSITION WHEN I GO TO WORK AND AFTER I COME BACK. I HAVE HAD TO POKE YOU TO SEE YOU ARE STILL IN THE BOOKS OF THE LIVING.”

“that’s pretty much, coming from another skeleton”.

“AGH!”

Elisa watched their quarrel quietly, noting how even though Papyrus looked miffed, both of the brothers seemed to enjoy this kind of banter.

“ANYWAYS! YOU TWO SIT DOWN, I WILL SERVE THE FOOD!”

As Elisa and Sans settled down, Sans cleared his throat quietly( _C’mon, he doesn’t even have a throat!_ ), seeming a bit anxious.

“uh, ‘bout the food… you don’t need to eat it, if you don’t want to. papyrus’ cooking skills are sorta... peculiar. just say the word and we can order take-out, though paps might be upset.”

“Oh no, it can’t be that bad, can it?”

It could.

The spaghetti consisted of pasta, which was somehow both soggy and charred black at spots and a red sauce, with unrecognizable pieces of supposedly vegetables and some grey mush. Elisa took her first taste. She was extremely glad of the skilled control of her face muscles. There were no spices or herbs whatsoever. Nor salt. Even her own food wasn’t this plain when it came to seasoning. She tasted tomato, raw carrot, and… banana peel. The banana was the grey mush. She furtively picked a sequin out of her mouth, setting it on the edge of her plate. It could be worse, she reasoned. Milk was offered with the food( _"FOR HEALTHY BONES!"_ ).

She was taught not to waste food, so she slowly emptied her whole plate aside from the sequins, charred pieces of pasta and banana peel that she was able to separate from the turmoil on her plate. While fishing away the inedibles and eating, she listened to Papyrus talk, answering politely but curtly if something was asked. She needed to concentrate on the food more. Papyrus didn’t seem to notice, peppily chattering away about his day at the amusement park front gate. Today a class of small human children visited the amusement park and he got to take a group picture with them, he explained enthusiastically. That sounded like progress, she thought. Sans was mostly silent, eating his portion with no complaint. He seemed to avoid looking at her eyes.

“SO, HOW WAS THE FOOD? I TRIED SUPER HARD TODAY!!”

Well, the milk was okay.

“great as always, paps.” She glanced at him. Maybe their sense of taste was truly so different?

She couldn’t nor wanted to lie. But she had formed a plan with a possible win-win situation for all of the parties.

“Do you want me to be fully honest with you, Papyrus?” She asked. Sans glared at her surreptitiously, but she pretended not to see it.

“OF COURSE! WAS SOMETHING WRONG WITH MY DISH?”

“Well… it wasn’t suitable for my palate. There were many things I couldn’t eat, as you can see.” She pointed at her plate, which had a decent amount of colorful sequins on it.

“They’d give me a stomach ache, us humans can be quite sensitive when it comes to food. But let me ask you… have you cooked for a human before?”

“NOW THAT YOU SAY IT, YOU ARE THE FIRST HUMAN I HAVE OFFERED MY FOOD TO.” His fixed, toothy grin turned a bit downwards when he realized this. Elisa continued swiftly.

“See? You’ve cooked only for monsters’ tastes before and that’s fine! But now that you have a human friend,” She pointed to herself, Papyrus’ eye sockets widened at ‘friend’, “Would you like me to teach you how to cook _the human way_? We can start with spaghetti, if you’d like!”

Papyrus’ happy grin returned. That’s more like it.

“I WOULD LOVE TO!! PLEASE, ELISA, TEACH ME YOUR HUMAN COOKING SECRETS!!!”

“Well then! I’m going to be busy tutoring evening laboratories for the next 2 weeks, so how does a Saturday lunch sound to you?”

He looked shy. “CAN WE GO TO YOUR PLACE? I WOULD LIKE TO MEET YOUR CATS…”

“Of course! Sans, you can come too of course, if you want.” She looked back to Papyrus. “He knows where I live now anyways so he can bring you.”

“k.”

They chatted while longer with some tea and afterwards she helped them clean the table, ignoring objections. Sans reminded that he needed to go to work soon and Papyrus had an early morning, so she hugged Papyrus goodbye and got out with Sans. The walk to the car was silent and they started driving.

“so uh… thanks. for being cool with paps. with the food i mean. didn’t expect you to actually eat it all. and what you suggested clearly made him really happy.

She was silent for a while, thinking how to say what was in her mind.

“Do you like his food? You ate it all up.”

“well... honestly? no. but it’s paps’ food, so it’s fine.”

“Why haven’t you told him you don’t like it? It was honestly rather horrid.” It felt bad to say out loud, she thought, but it was true.

“he learned from undyne. she’s his best friend and like a role model to him, so he’s been just following her teachings. like i said, i don’t mind. as long as he likes it and is happy, i’m happy.” Elisa didn't notice how his voice had gotten a bit sharp.

“That doesn’t sound very healthy. Not to mention unfair to him. He seems so kind and happy so I understand upsetting him is the last thing in your mind, but he needs to know so that he can learn and grow.”

She was looking in front of her, only hearing some unintelligible mumbling. Lying just didn’t sit with her. She was stubborn only about a few things, this being one of them. Especially when it came to someone innocent like Papyrus. She was set with her point of view, wishing to point it out the best she could, so she continued.

“I know I barely know you, but I hope you’re not holding anything else from hi-”

“you’re right.”

Elisa felt relieved for a second, if he understood then he could interact better with Papyrus. She turned to look at him-

He was turned to her, his eye sockets were dark, void of light.

“you do barely know us, so maybe _ **l a y  i t  o f f**_ , huh?”

Her eyes widened and she turned to watch in front of her again, clutching her hands. She felt a tinge of fear.

_No._

She reminded herself that he had brought Toriel to her during that same day, he cared about him and he wasn’t going to hurt him. She trusted him in that aspect.

After the fear there was a short surge of anger. She was right! He didn’t need to be so gruff! But she’d been too pushy. She hadn’t really had a proper argument with anyone except her mother in years, so she wasn’t going to push her luck.

She may be their friend now, but she still knew so little of them as people. She’d be more careful with her words. Something small like this shouldn’t become a problem, no matter how she felt about it.

They were silent the rest of the drive. Sans turned the car in the end of the road, where she lived.

“m’sorry.” He mumbled.

“No. I was out of line. It is none of my business how you communicate with your brother.” She got out of the car.

“Doesn’t make what I said untrue. Thanks for the ride, Sans.” She said with a sad smile, closing the door.

 

/ / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /

 

_shitshitshitshitshitshit why must i screw everything up!!_

He drove the car back and just shortcutted back to his room, falling on the bed. He still had one hour before going to work, so he could brood in peace. Papyrus was probably already in bed, he was always out like a light and slept like a log. A loud one, at that.

He’d been so happy to finally pick her up. It was almost intoxicating how her soul shone and she was bursting with positive energy, when she threw the candies at him and did her little hand walking trick. Toriel must’ve really made that soup potent with magic. And she was keeping up with his puns! Truly phenomenal.

He had finally made a stable shield against her emotions. He hated it with passion. He still felt all of her emotions but they were dampened down tremendously. He could concentrate on driving and talking with her, sure, but he would’ve rather focused on her soul. _d_ _amn that sounds unhealthy, but hell if it isn't true._

And she was so great with his brother! Clearly she didn’t like the food, but she’d turned the situation for her advantage, making his brother happy in the progress. Things went downhill in the car.

It was a little white lie. Didn’t hurt anyone. Papyrus was happy and didn’t need to change anything about what he did. Sans was already used to the taste of his spaghetti, as Papyrus served it every day. He barely even tasted the banana anymore.

He hadn’t expected her to be so serious about it. Her soul bursted with honesty, worry, justness and some stubbornness. He would’ve thought the stubbornness cute any other time, but then she’d called it unhealthy, wrong towards his brother and implied(well it sounded like it) that he was keeping other things from him. Deep inside him he knew that she was right. Still...

_“SANS! ARE YOU OKAY? YOU KNOW YOU CAN TALK TO ME.”_

_“yeah, everything’s okay, bro. i’m fine.”_

He’d had that conversation and it’s different versions more often than he’d hoped for. Papyrus didn’t need to worry about him. He’d be fine as long as Papyrus was happy.

He’d snapped at her and regretted it immediately. But he was too stubborn to say anything and had just kept on driving. He felt her emotions shift rapidly from relief to confusion to fear to anger to sadness to… Wariness. _crap._

He glanced at her soul and there it was. He’d completely forgotten about her shield when he picked her up, but now it was up, as thick as it was in the morning when she still had a migraine. Her anxiety was back stronger, when it used to be just a speck in a corner. Her soul didn’t shine anymore.

He had caused this. The spike of fear had been very short, but it had been there. He’d scared her, even for a moment and that truth twisted his soul painfully. She’d put her shield up again and would likely try to hide her thoughts and feelings again, withdrawing into herself. He could feel her emotions yes, but if she wasn’t open about them it was distressing.

He’d had the sense to apologise but not to say anything else. She'd blamed herself but at least didn’t go back on her opinion. She'd had an eerily cold and calm tone.

 

_i’ll fix this. if not during the week, then maybe on saturday…_

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who is right? Who is wrong? Will there be more spaghetti? Stay tuned!


	7. Unheard Confession

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing some more amnesia, anxiety over friendship and two angles of a girl who ran too far
> 
> Chapter tags: Amnesia, anxiety, self-harm through exhaustion
> 
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

At one point she was closing the car door and walking towards her house-

The next she was standing in her basement, shivering. Her throat  felt painful, as if she’d been panting forcefully, or shouting. She had sweaty exercise clothes on, a t-shirt and shorts. Her knuckles and insteps of her feet were scraped and slightly bloody. In front of her was her free standing yellow heavy bag, now lightly smudged red with blood. She looked at the clock on the wall. _2.5 hours since she’d left Sans’ and Papyrus’ apartment._ She sighed, cleaned the blood of the bag and herself and went upstairs to shower.

The evidence told that she had gone and trained till she bled. At least her opponent was a bag instead of a human. She hadn’t used the heavy bag in years, focusing on running and basic muscle training. But some part of her continued the use. It had been some months now that this had happened. But then again, such things happened more or less often and she wasn’t fazed by them anymore. Being terrified simply didn’t help, so she just carried on the best she could.

Follow the flow.

 

\- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

 

The next week was more or less normal; either she woke startled or screaming from a dream she couldn’t remember or was already in the kitchen, or even outside at her bike. A couple of hours lost in the evenings here and there, but nothing had happened, or so it seemed. She didn’t have any other dreams either, which was new. Usually she had a couple inconvenient dreams a week. _No matter, just move on with what you’ve got._ She went to the university at a later time, as her schedule was different for a while. She spent a lot of time with Alphys; she was bringing more and more of her own research papers and books into their room, filling her side of the office. The cushioned wall next to her table filled with miscellaneous notes and pictures of her and Undyne. Once she was settled, they both worked in a comfortable silence, sometimes talking a few words. She introduced her to the rest of the university campus; the different faculties, restaurants, laboratories, libraries, study lounges and bigger lecture halls. They’d had nothing like this in the Underground, so she was understandably impressed. Elisa noticed how the other staff and students peered at her mostly curiously, there were only few people who gawked or scowled. She thought she saw a camera flash somewhere. A noticeable amount of monsters enrolled this year since the fence opened and the university accepted them with open arms, as long as they filled the education requirements. Elisa was happy how generally the people in the university were accepting of them.

Sometimes Undyne would come in the evening after her work and they’d go out for dinner or even drive to either one’s apartment and cook their own, before she’d go to her tutoring job. Their apartment was decorated from the bottom to the top; There were colorful posters, figurines, plush toys, full DVD-cases of anime and bookshelves filled with manga. The apartment was so full she wondered how they’d organized it all if they’d just moved in last week. The living room carpet had a large picture of a pink cat girl. Elisa didn’t recognize any of the imaginary characters but listened calmly as they both gushed over some of the latest episodes of some anime series they’d watched. She was more of a calm book person. When she was talking to them separately, she’d talk with Alphys about something to do with their research or other science, with Undyne she’d talk about exercise and different sports, how they differed between monsters and humans.

She learned more of the couple during their dinners too; Alphys didn’t want to talk about her past too much, but Undyne gladly told about her youth and how she became the Head of the Royal Guard with the help of the King, who was like a father figure to her. They were both too shy to talk about how they got together and Elisa didn’t push. Elisa told them mostly general details of her life, how she’d first lived in Finland with her mother and moved to Ebott City when she started high school. It was hard to tell anything properly when she had a bunch of gaps in her memory and most of the memories she did have weren’t very cheerful. She replaced that with talking about the countries, their history, culture and traditions. They ate it right up. Alphys had told her that the monsters were given a brief history of the last thousand years during the first months they had gotten to the surface. War and weapons was the main subject, scientific progress came after. It was probably refreshing to hear about human history that wasn’t about violence and death.

As much fun as she always had with Alphys and Undyne, she had this nagging voice gnawing inside her head. She’d tried to ignore it, but it always returned when she was alone.

_You’re only waiting for the inevitable_

_You’ll screw it up_

_You’ll ask something wrong_

_You’ll do something wrong_

_Leave before it will hurt even more_

_They’ll leave you_

**_They’ll hate you_ **

Sans’ black eye sockets flashed in her mind.

… Even if she tried to concentrate on something else, the voice wouldn’t go away. Usually the nagging was weak, coming up when she was planning to go out to see some event or when she was talking a bit more with a colleague than usually. She understood the point of the voice.

_Stay away from things that could hurt you, that way you’ll stay safe. You can only blame yourself when you screw up and you’ll be all alone again._

Medication could only do so much to keep the nagging away, and she was on so many different kinds by now that their side effects needed their own medication. So she’d tried to reduce the burden on her body and psyche by figuring out a different kind of fix by herself.

It was Friday evening and there was no lab to tutor. She was home alone with her thoughts which she didn’t want to listen to anymore, so she decided to go for a run. _Just an hour or so, maybe it’ll help me relax._ She took her phone with her and started to listen to music while jogging to warm up. She didn’t listen to music usually. She enjoyed sounds of nature more, which reminded her that she should really go for a hike again after a long time. But she loaded the angriest music she could find for these kinds of runs on her phone, with screaming, distorted guitar solos and maniacal drumming to distract herself.

She chose a random direction and started to run. Listening to a man growl and scream his anger and pain into her ears.

_You’ll screw up sooner or later._

She reached the suburbs and then the forest line. She felt tired. Just a bit more.

_Give up before they give up on you._

She ran into the forest, on the lonely road, without seeing any cars. Her muscles started to ache. A bit more.

_You always ruin everything, why even try continuing this facade?_

Two hours had passed. Her throat and chest were burning. Her had a metallic taste in her mouth. A while longer.

 _Could you withstand the pain of losing everyone?_ **_Why not leave first so it’ll hurt less?_ **

The forest and the road continued endlessly, which was fine with her. She felt her legs cramp and she could barely breathe anymore. Everything hurt. Her head was starting to swim. That’s more like it.

Her breathing was ragged as she finally stopped. Not because she wanted to, but her legs just wouldn’t listen to her anymore. She managed to keep on standing, though she was shivering uncontrollably. She looked around, realizing that she was in the middle of a forest, 3 hours running distance from home. The road was small and didn’t probably lead to any big habitation, so there would be no bus. She decided to call a cab, or else she’d be walking all night. She had a message waiting for her.

 **Sans:** hey, how’s it going? haven’t heard of you since monday. is it still okay that we both come on saturday?

Oh, Sans. The nagging voice was the strongest, when she thought about him. She knew he hadn’t meant to snap at her like that. His remorseful face told enough when he mumbled his apology. But the eyes void of light still haunted her, though she didn’t want them to. They hadn’t kept contact since Monday.

 **Elisa:** Of course you are both welcome. Never think otherwise. I’m on a run, but I ran a bit too far, calling a cab right now.

Immediately, the phone started ringing. He was calling her. She closed the loud music and answered, realizing too late that her voice might not sound the best. “Hello?” _Oh god, it sounds so raspy…_

“oh my god are you okay? what happened to your voice?” He sounded distressed.

“Yes, I’m good. Like I wrote,” she paused to cough, “I ran too much and too long. Bad habit. Why did you call?”

“wanted to ask do you want me to pick you up but now i _know_ i will pick you up. where are you?”

“Sans, you don’t need to-”

“c’mon bud, i insist. you sound _bone tired_ , let me help you out. _please_.” He pleaded.

Elisa didn’t understand why he was so insistent about it, but she gave up. She didn’t want to upset him any more and he might be there faster than a cab anyways.

“I just kept on following the road that”, she coughed again, “leads from my house to the red old theater building to west into the forest.”

“into the for- how long did you run?! don’t answer that, i’ll start driving. stay next to the road.” He hung up.

He’d sounded pretty mad. She guessed it was bizarre, to run till she sounded like she’d eaten sand paper and so far out of the city, too. She wanted to start walking back, but it took all her willpower to just keep on standing. She felt so exhausted but she couldn’t sit down. She’d woken up in a ditch enough many times to learn it wasn’t a good idea.

Half an hour she just stood still, swaying around gently. Her breathing had calmed down, though she kept on coughing from time to time. The exhaustion kept her head empty, as she used all her concentration in staying awake and standing. Finally the red convertible slowed down in front of her and Sans got out. He looked at her incredulously.

“what were you thinking? why would you run all the way here?”

“I just felt like running. For… a long time.”

“sure. just a run, huh? ‘till you look like you’ll collapse if anyone pokes you?”

She didn’t say anything and just kept on swaying and shivering.

“please don’t tell me you’ve done this before.”

She looked away. It answered him well enough and he gave a mirthless chortle.

“you can’t just- what if something happened to you here in the middle of nothing? _how can you be so reckless?”_

Elisa turned to look at him. Sans’ eye lights had been hazy pin pricks, but now the lights disappeared and he looked ominous once more and his grin looked painfully wide.

She felt the tinge of fear similar from Monday, but it was quickly replaced by anger. She’d just spent 3 hours to get rid of the voices in her head for them to be replaced by another one to make her feel scared and guilty. How dare he come shout to her! It’s none of his business, just like his business wasn’t hers. She at least tried to respect that fact! Her shivering progressed onto shaking. Her hands clenched into fists. She wasn’t used to shouting, she just didn’t shout, ever, and now her voice sounded even worse as she raised it.

“ ** _You_ ** want to know why I run till exhaustion? After you-”

She realized that her anger was rising too high and she could feel it bubbling dangerously, taking control over her consciousness. Fortunately if it came to that, she wouldn’t cause any damage in her exhausted state. It didn’t mean that she wanted to lose control. She moved her concentration onto her mind, making her collapse painfully on her knees. She breathed slowly in and out while hugging herself, clasping her arms with her fingers till it hurt. The method was easier now, she had better control.

**_C a l m ._ **

Her mind emptied to stillness, but her body kept on shaking as she stayed on her knees, staring at the road. She saw Sans’ pink slippers in front of her.

“I... have my reasons. That I wish not to share. Think I said this already. If it’s too much to ask, I…”

She scrunched her eyes shut. She didn’t want to finish the sentence. She didn’t even know how. Sans didn’t say anything, so she continued.

“Remember how I said I’m curious but not tactless? I also said I respect your privacy. At least until I screwed up on Monday evening by being pushy with my opinion.”

“you didn’t screw up anyth-”

She looked up to him again. His eye lights were back, but barely there. His hands were up as if reaching for her, his face looked pained.

“ _You know_ **_nothing_ ** _about me_. Nothing too personal. I’ve kept it that way, because…” Again, she wasn’t sure how to continue with that phrase. She shook her head.

“I’m guessing that you have your reasons for telling me to back off, too. It _saddens_ me that you can’t be honest with your brother, or maybe even with me if we were to talk about… ourselves,” Her voice broke as she continued and she dropped her head down again.

“Because _I can’t_ , and I can’t ask that of you. I’m too afraid that it will ruin everything... I-I don’t want to be... alone, _again_.”

She couldn’t stop gripping on her arms. They would surely be bruised later. Her fingernails were digging into her flesh. It was hard to stay on her knees, but she couldn’t get up. Her mind felt hazy again, now because of sheer exhaustion.

She saw bony knees set on the ground on the sides of hers and felt him hug her gently, but tight nonetheless. He cradled her head on his shoulder with his hand. _How is his body emanating so much warmth…_

“i’m so, so sorry… i’m such an idiot. i’m sorry for scaring you on monday, for snapping at you, even though in the morning i had said i want you to be okay. i’m sorry for shouting and scaring you now, again. i’m not- we’re not going anywhere and no one is forcing you to say anything you don’t want to, just like toriel said.”

His grip tightened. She heard his voice next to his head and felt it vibrating in his thoracic cavity in front of her arms crossed against her chest.

“i was and still am, just, so worried... but i understand how you feel. more than you know.” He said with a sorrowful, quiet voice.

Elisa could finally stop gripping on her arms. She let her hands relax, but they were kept up by Sans’ arms in his hold. He sighed.

“... tell you what? i’ll try to be more honest with paps. and you. and if i ever feel like opening my jaw for something else than puns, i’ll come to you. in exchange, if you ever feel like opening up… i’ll be there for you. no matter what.“

He loosened the hug and lifted her chin gently with his index digit so he could look at her eyes.

“you won’t be alone again. i swear on the open skies. i hate making promises, so you better believe it.” He had a sad, small grin-smile, but his eye lights were bright, focused on her.

She looked at his eyes and even though she still felt hollow after calming herself, she felt a flutter of something peculiar inside her. Something warm and comfortable, that let her relax a bit. This is the Sans she knew and cared for from Monday morning and what he said now was the truth. She wanted to help him if she could, and who knew, maybe some day she could tell him…

She nodded. Sans let out a relieved sigh.

“now let’s get you out of here, you’re shaking so much it’s _rattling my bones_.”

She felt being lifted effortlessly and carried to the car. She couldn’t remember much else, just that next she was laying on the lowered front seat, listening to the car hum. The next moment she was being lifted again and carried somewhere else. She heard Lievo meow. _Right, they should be fed._  She was laid down onto something soft and her shoes were taken off. Something cool was wiping her face, knees and arms. Something warm covered her and she promptly fell into deep sleep.

 

/ / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /

 

He hadn’t felt this mad in a while. Seeing her in such a drained state in the evening in the middle of a forest, far away from the city. She was drenched in sweat, shivering and coughing, with a withdrawn look on her face. He had expected to run into her much, much earlier. His worry had deepened as he kept on driving. He couldn’t have passed her, right?

So he’d snapped, once again, instead of taking care of her first. Her emotions acted the same way as on Monday in the car, but this time, the anger stayed. And it kept on growing, as she started to shake harder.

“ ** _You_ ** want to know why I run till exhaustion? After you-” She couldn’t finish her sentence, as Sans saw what was happening to her soul. Red was seeping into it again, but from the other corner of the heart shape. The feeling of anger was first bubbling rather benign, but it felt like it could suddenly ignite and burn through her. His magic reacted again, but this time not for a fight-or-flight situation, it felt... Violent.

He controlled his magic as he saw her collapse on her knees, grabbing herself, staring forward with big, focused eyes. She looked scary, then. As she took in a deep breath, the needle shield around her soul expanded faster than last time and turned red, raising her Intent once more. She slumped a bit, still shaking. The anger was gone and her soul felt like a void, with weak emotions of weariness, anxiety and sadness drifting in the emptiness.

_why do i keep on doing this to her? she’s the first human i’ve gotten even remotely close to and it feels like all i’ve brought her is pain._

Guilt gnawed at him as she talked about her insecurities she’d pointed out to him and Toriel on Sunday. He tried to stop her as she blamed herself again, but she looked up at him with those piercing, deep blue eyes, with an expression that was somehow fierce, desperate and _empty_ at the same time.

“ _You know_ **_nothing_ ** _about me_. Nothing too personal. I’ve kept it that way, because…” She fell silent, shaking her head on her already shaking body.

It was true, he knew nothing about her and she didn't know anything about him. He wanted to know everything about her, wanted to be close to her, he'd missed her all week, but he couldn't wish for that without giving her something in return. _i can’t offer that, she doesn’t need to know about what i used to be. what i had to experience to finally get here. it’s too much. she’ll probably want me to stay away from now on-_

The now-transparent shield around her soul was still as thick as before so she probably felt mostly empty, but emotions erupted back into her soul. The largest of them was the feeling of crushing loneliness.

“I’m guessing that you have your reasons for telling me to back off, too. It _saddens_ me that you can’t be honest with your brother, or maybe even with me if we were to talk about… ourselves, because _I can’t_ , and I can’t ask that of you. I’m too afraid that it will ruin everything... I-I don’t want to be... alone, _again_.”

Her blank face didn’t fit the torrent in her soul. She looked downright miserable, barely staying upright while kneeled down. Blood trickled down her arms where she was clutching with her now pale fingers, Sans noticed, alarmed.

_she has things about her she wants to hide. she is afraid of being alone. she hides her feelings under a mask._

_she is just like me._

_what the fuck am i still doing, just standing here?_

He finally crashed in front of her and hugged her. Her shirt and hair were  damp from sweat but he couldn’t give a damn, hugging her tight. Even through his shield her emotions poured through his soul. The loneliness she felt, it was an ancient, repetitious emotion and it hurt, so so much. It was too similar to what he had felt multiple times before. _The sight of him holding his brother’s dusty red scarf flashed in his mind._ No, Papyrus is alive and well. They all were, that memory was in the past, it wasn’t reality and it wouldn’t happen. He  felt almost fully assured about that. But now he had to concentrate on Elisa, these were her emotions, after all. So he held her, apologised to her, tried to make her understand. Promised her that they could always talk and he’d always be there. He’d make sure she’d never feel alone again. He never wanted her to feel that crushing emotion if he could help it. Slowly as he talked, he felt her muscles relax, even if she kept on shaking. She stopped hurting her arms. The deafening negative emotions inside her quieted down and when he held her head up to look into her eyes as he wanted to truly message her how serious he was being at that moment about his promise, the feeling of loneliness was almost gone. And there was another, small feeling. Sans didn’t quite grasp it from under his shield and it was gone before he could try to sense it better. It was something warm and tender. She nodded and he let out a breath that he hadn’t realized he was holding in.

She was about to collapse, so he carried her to the car. He could have levitated her with her soul but… Holding her like this felt better. He had to hold her torso up for a moment while he opened the door and set the front seat into reclined position before lifting her on it to lay down. She was half-asleep, mumbling. He thought he heard words here and there, but he couldn’t understand them. Probably in her native tongue. Since she was sleeping, he decided to remove the shield around his soul. He shouldn’t be overwhelmed as long as she wasn’t dreaming about something highly emotional. The shield felt uncomfortable, in addition to him disliking it. He drove back to her place and found her keys from her pocket, carrying her in. Her cats were greeting them, the black one meowed. Elisa twitched at that, mumbling a bit louder.

“don’t worry, i’ll feed them. let’s get you comfortable.” That presented him with happy sounding mumbling and he smiled.

He found her bedroom and set her down on her bed and took her running shoes off. He wouldn’t dare taking her sweaty clothes off, but he found a small towel and went to moisten it in the bathroom sink. He cleaned her bloody knees, hands and arms and wiped her face. The wounds didn’t bleed anymore, which he was happy about, he only knew that blood is supposed to stay in the human or they’ll die. He had first-hand experience on that from his memories, he thought grimly. He put the towel to dry on the hamper, covered her with her blanket and took a moment to study her. She looked calm now and didn’t shiver or cough anymore. He took one of her hands in his own, examining it. The knuckles had reddened scrapes that looked under a week old. There were plenty of small scratches here and there, most of them looked old. Would she tell him, if he asked where they came from? Her hands felt rough, but the skin on her arm felt smooth, especially on the under arm. He’d never had the chance to touch human skin before, so he was fascinated. Curiosity drove him to continue as he kept on prodding and grabbing the supple skin, feeling the different bones under the skin and flesh. They felt so thin, compared to his. So fragile.

“Hnnn…”

A silent whine rose from Elisa’s throat. Weak feeling of enjoyment flowed from her soul, but it was enough to almost make him whine himself.

Sans went completely stiff and his whole face flushed cyan.

 _oh gods why am i fondling her arm while she’s unconscious. this is_ **_not_ ** _okay._

He set it down and was about to leave, he had to leave for work soon anyways, when he felt something weakly pull at his coat. It was her hand. She mumbled something that Sans couldn’t understand again, but there was a short flicker of loneliness in her soul.

“okay, i’ll stay a while longer.”

He covered her properly, leaving her hand out so he could hold it. Her hand squeezed his a while before going limp again, as she fell deeper into her slumber. He caressed her hand with his thumb. Her soul was still mildly active as she sleeped and the emotions inside it were calm and content. It felt very comfortable opening his soul wholly to their caress, lulling him into a peace of mind that was a rare state to him. _i could get used to this._ A realization came to him as he was counting back the events of the week. He didn’t think of her as “Elisa’s soul” anymore, but about her as whole. And he did think about her every day, almost all the time. Not contacting her had been almost physically painful, but he wasn’t sure did she want to talk to him after Monday. It had taken a lot of fretting over sending the message earlier. Now he was extremely glad he had. Even with his shield up she had always been pleasant company, who sincerely liked him and the others the way they were, respecting them. She wasn’t like the other humans in many aspects, which was perfect in his mind. She didn’t try to hide or change what she looked like and was always honest. He felt the want to help her, protect her and be with her grow stronger every day and today that urge was at it’s strongest.

_dammit._

“i might be falling for you.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Read what Elisa mumbles [Here!](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/post/150490809110/addition-to-patchwork-chapter-7-thought-id-add)
> 
> The doki doki intensifies ɷ◡ɷ
> 
> What do you think about the double POV writing I'm doing? I like it, but I'm wondering am I repeating the events too much.


	8. Cooking Lesson: Part 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing awkward nerd Sans, more spaghetti madness for my pastasexuals out there and confessions!
> 
> Chapter tags: Spaghetti madness, lie confession
> 
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

Elisa woke up in her bed. Peacefully. There were no dreams. _Huh_.

Her body however soon reminded her that last evening had taken a toll on her body, which might explain her comatose sleep. Everything hurt and her heart rate was faster than usual. She had a headache but not the migraine kind, _thank god for that_. She felt exhausted, even though it was 7am and she supposed she went to sleep before 11pm-

_Waitwaitwaitwaitwait. Wait. How did I get home?_

She vaguely remembered passing out, after Sans came to fetch her. Right, right. She ran too long and dragged Sans right into her mess. _Great job, Elisa_. Before she could wonder further how she got into her bed, she glanced on the night table and spied a full glass of water that somehow wasn’t pushed over by the cats and a piece of paper. Groggily she first drunk the whole glass and mourned when it was empty; she had really been dehydrated as she didn’t drink during or after her run. Then she read the paper. The handwriting was small and neat.

**brought you back yesterday, you were kinda out of it. sorry, sorta broke into your house with the keys in your pocket. cleaned your wounds just with a towel, you might want to call toriel and ask her to heal them better. fed your cats with the dry cat food stuff i found in the cupboard. write me when you wake up, so i know you’re okay.**

**see you to** ** _marrow_ ** **, or depending on when you are reading this, today.**

**sans**

… Oh.

She remembered then, how they’d talked, he held her and they'd made a deal. _So it wasn’t a completely failed evening._ She took her blanket off, noticing that she still had her exercise clothes on. She supposed he’d been too embarrassed to take them off, which she understood. She wouldn’t have cared either way, she trusted him. Which was weird, but she knew it was true. She felt that he wouldn’t do anything to her that she didn’t allow. The logical part of her mind was screaming profanities at her, but she pushed it away. She started taking the now-dry, but smelly clothes off. Under her sports bra she still had skin tape covering her nipples and it started to feel itchy. She peeled it off gently. She was glad now that she’d covered them just in case, as she wasn’t sure how long she would run. Learning that little tip hadn't been very fun. Taking a ride home with a bus had been filled with horrified glances, as her shirt had two long red streaks. _It’s just my nipples bleeding, mind your own business,_ she had thought.

She stretched carefully and started to feel better, her headache easing. She took her medication, went to shower, hissing as she found all her scratches and bruises. They were slightly infected but not bad otherwise, Sans had only cleaned dirt off them. Not bad enough to bother Toriel about them, they’d heal sooner or later.

She dried herself, put on underwear, socks, jeans and a thin black turtleneck shirt to cover her wounds, tended to the cats and while preparing breakfast she texted Sans.

 **Elisa:** Thank you for bringing me home yesterday. I don’t want to bother Toriel, the wounds will heal fine by themselves. Sorry you had to see me like that.

As she munched on her sandwich and read a book, she got an answer. She hadn’t expected him to be awake at this time.

 **Sans:** _snow_ problem. please don’t apologise, i was happy to help. i meant what i said yesterday, about talking and being there.

 **Elisa:** I know, I believe you. See you and Papyrus at 12?

 **Sans:** you _bed_

What? Ah, you bet. She hummed a bit and prepared to go out. She had some shopping to do, before they came.

 

\- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

 

She’d just returned from the grocery store and put everything ready as the doorbell rang. She opened it and as expected, was pulled into a crushing hug by Papyrus. She wasn’t anxious at all anymore, she thought in the back of her head, while laughing with him. He set him down, today he had a green pullover on.

“HELLO ELISA! IT’S SO NICE TO SEE YOU AGAIN AND YOUR HOUSE!!!”

“Please come in! I’ll introduce you to the house and my babies.”

“BABIES?? YOU DIDN’T SAY YOU HAVE CHILDREN?!!”

She laughed. “I meant my cats! I just call them my babies. But please Papyrus, try to be calm, they’re not used to loud voices.”

Papyrus slinked into the apartment more silent than usual, quickly kicking his red sneakers off at the door. She heard him coo surprisingly restrained as he apparently saw her cats. She was focused on Sans, who’d been behind Papyrus. He was wearing long black pants, a dark blue zipper hoodie and a black t-shirt underneath. The pink slippers were still there, though. He was looking downwards, rubbing the back of his head while the other hand was deep inside his hoodie pocket. The edges of his eye sockets looked even darker than usual. Actually, now that she thought about it, they were always a bit dark. Papyrus’ weren’t. He had that interesting shade of cyan on his cheekbones. _Was he blushing, why?_

“uh, hi. good to see that you’re okay again, I-!” His breath hitched as she hugged him. She got a déjà-vu feeling and chuckled. Sans finally hugged her back after a moment.

“Sans, you don’t need to act shy with me. I should be embarrassed instead of you!”

“buh- w-why…?” Elisa eased off of him, still holding his clavicles. Her tone was soft-spoken.

“Even though we messaged this morning, I still want to thank you face-to-face. And to apologise.” She squeezed the top of his humeri and looked at his chest, not really seeing it. She remembered the hug yesterday, how horrible she had felt and how that feeling had melted away with his help. She’d never been in this much physical contact with anyone, but it felt natural and safe to do with him.

“I didn’t mean for anyone to see me that way. I’m trying to cope with my problems my own way and it can cause me to do weird things from time to time. But I’m glad you were there. I’ve taken your promises to heart. And don’t forget, you’re my friend now, I hope you’ll… open your jaw to me, as you said. And I’ll try the same.” She smiled and looked back to his face, which had his normal, unreadable grin, but his eyelights were hazy and quivering and the blush was still there.

“y-yeah.” He looked like he wanted to say more, but instead started to stare down at the door step, so she let him go.

“C’mon in! I’ll find you something to do while I’m in the kitchen with Papyrus.”

They found Papyrus sitting on the floor, keeping his extended arm out patiently as Lievo was sniffing his fingers. His face however told that he was nearly hysterical. His throat sounded like a silent, hissing, boiling water cooker.

“The one sniffing you is Lievo, the other one is Hippa. They are both male cats and they’re brothers. If you give them time and patience like you are doing now, they will come to you and you will not get rid of them. They adore attention and all sorts of scratches.”

At that, Lievo brushed his cheek against Papyrus’ hand and he seemed to try his very best to stay still. He gently started to scratch behind his ears and he started to purr. Hippa came to sniff and rub at his knee. Papyrus might as well been vibrating, he was restricting his excitement so much. Elisa was giggling silently looking at the view and saw Sans smiling too, clearly fond of his brother’s happiness.

“They seem to like you! Just keep them purring like that and you’re going a great job. Sans, do you read?” Sans snapped to attention when hearing his name.

“huh? yeah, i do. why?”

“It’s just that, I don’t have that many things to do here. I just have my TV and books. I’ve got Netflix for some documents, but I barely use it. I haven’t really had to entertain guests before. So you are welcome to introduce yourself to my bookshelf. Most of them are science books, but…”

Sans started to speak slightly on top of her.

“really, you don’t need to think about what i do- what science books?” His eye lights brightened.

“Ah well, I’m doing my doctorate in biochemistry, but I had quite a lot of spare time during my studies so I majored in physics and minored in biology and chemistry too as well as studied a bunch of languages…”

He gave her a funny look.

“you’ve kept busy, huh? could I check on your physics books? could see how human physics are different from what i’ve learned.”

“Yes, right here... You have an academic background?”

He hesitated a moment. “... yeah, sorta. pretty much grew in a lab with my bro. learned a thing or two there, helped maintain the core, such stuff.” Sans said distractedly, while browsing the books. He picked up a book about quantum physics. “But haven’t really been involved with that stuff for many years now.”

“Huh.” She looked at him as he sat down on the sofa and started to read the book without any further issues. She’d have to inquire him later about this. She’d read about the CORE. A massive construction, which turns geothermal energy into magical electricity, giving power to all of the Underground. Such technology would be game changing for the whole Earth. The rest of the CORE’s functionality had been kept top secret upon Asgore’s command, however. He was truly serious about not giving anything more than necessary to humans, before they’d get their full rights. But if Sans had actually helped maintain it, he’d have to have an professional engineering background of some kind. She might be able to coach him to continue his career, if he let her. It sounded like a horrible waste otherwise. She returned to Papyrus, who was now laying on the floor smiling gleefully, scratching the cats as both of them were stepping in his rib cage letting out their specific purring-chirping noises. He seemed to have calmed down from his excitement, now just content to be there, surrounded by fluff. Lievo laid down under his jaw, making him giggle.

“Oh Papyrus, is that okay? They’re both around 15 pounds heavy, they can easily press the breath out of me if I’m laying down…”

He surprised her with a decent strength volume. “Oh this is absolutely fine. Undyne elbow drops on me on weekly basis during our training!”

“Training? You guys spar?”

“Yes we do indeed! She was my boss in Underground and I wanted to get into the Royal Guard so she would train me! Both in cooking and fighting!!”

Elisa glanced at Sans, who either didn’t hear them or pretended not to. She’d have to ask Undyne about their cooking training.

“Now that the Royal Guard doesn’t exist anymore except in name, we just keep on training for exercise. Or well, I exercise while trying not to get beaten up. She doesn’t really have a button in between on and off when it comes to fighting!”

“she’s a _train_ wreck, i’d say.”

“SANS!!”

Papyrus’ riled up shout chased the cats off of him, making him wail a little. Sans snickered, she chuckled and offered him a hand, pulling him up. He was _very_ heavy for a skeleton and had to help himself, she couldn’t have pulled him up all by herself. She decided not to talk more about the sparring, remembering her latest basement incident.

“They’ll return to you later. Shall we start our cooking lesson, Papyrus?”

“OH YES! THAT WAS THE WHOLE POINT WE CAME HERE FOR AFTER ALL!!”

She smiled and let him to the kitchen. It was modest; stove with oven, microwave, sink, cupboards and two table tops to work on, one separating the  kitchen from the living room.  She gave him a black apron, donning on a similar one and tying her hair up to a ponytail with a hairband. She had spread a variety of ingredients on one of the tables: Different pastas, vegetables, spices, herbs, cheeses and meats.

“Now for starters, I want you to show me how you cooked your own spaghetti dish.”

“OKAY! FIRST WE NEED TO PUNCH THE VEGETABLES INTO SMITHEREENS!!!”

As he grabbed a bunch of random vegetables and saw him raise his fist, she quickly grabbed his raised humerus before he could slam his fist on the counter top.

“On second thought, how about you _tell_ me how you prepared your spaghetti. We only have these ingredients, after all.”

And so he did.

Oh boy.

Apparantly Undyne had taught him to pound vegetables they’d find from the grocery store or outside into mush with their fists, then scraping them off the ceiling, walls, kitchen counter and floor into a bowl. Then they’d throw the pasta with the packaging violently into a pot, mixing vigorously, turning the heat as high as possible( _"_ _YOUR STOVE CAN’T GET THAT HOT, THOUGH!!”_ ) and usually at this point they’d run out as the kitchen- and sometimes the whole house- exploded. Papyrus emphasized that passion and lots of shouting were an important part of the successful cooking experience and one must never forget to do a perfect landing when somersaulting out of the door or window. Only later on Papyrus had learned to add water in the mix and some of his own ingredients( _“SEQUINS ARE SO PRETTY! I ALSO USED GLUE BUT IT GOT STUCK IN MY TEETH."_ ), without somehow causing an incredible amount of damage. She’d _really_ need to have a talk with Undyne about this.

“Thank you Papyrus, for explaining. That is... _completely different_ to how humans prepare spaghetti, though. Or any other dish, actually. We will be _much more gentle_ with out ingredients and well, uh, everything else. No punching, no extreme heat, no… acrobatics. Is that okay with you?”

“I WILL LEARN SO MANY NEW THINGS TODAY!!!”

“Let’s first start with spices. I didn’t taste any salt or other seasoning in your spaghetti, how come?”

“I DIDN’T KNOW THEY WERE NEEDED. I HAVEN’T TASTED MY SPAGHETTI.”

Elisa knew she looked flabbergasted. “... Pardon? Can you… not taste?”

“I CAN! I JUST HAVE TO CONJURE OUT MY TONGUE. HERE!”

At that, his right eye socket flashed orange for a moment and an orange, glowing, translucent tongue formed in his open mouth. It looked similar to a human tongue, even if it looked somewhat longer. Elisa heard a choked sound come from the sofa, but it was turned away from the kitchen so she couldn’t see did Sans make the noise or what. She turned back to Papyrus.

“Woah, it’s so pretty! So with this, you can taste normally?”

“YEHH I HAM-” He closed his mouth- “I MEAN, YES I CAN! IT AFFECTS MY SMELLING TOO! YOU MEAN THAT TASTING IS VERY IMPORTANT IN HUMAN COOKING?!”

“... Yes. Oh Paps, you are truly going to learn a lot today.”

So she started with the tasting aspect, making him taste everything he wasn’t familiar with before in her whole kitchen, making sure he realized the difference between tastes like salty, spicy, savory, sweet and acidic, explaining how those tastes are combined in different foods. Then she moved onto explaining about inedible things, from various vegetable and fruit peels(like, banana) to items that should go nowhere near human digestion system, like certain handcrafting items. She found some glue and made him taste it with his tongue and he had to agree, it didn’t taste that good. Then she continued on the use of a knife, first how to sharpen one, how to cut the vegetables in different ways depending on what were they used for and how to use the knife without damaging yourself. With Papyrus it wasn’t such a problem as he was all bones, but scratches could still happen. While she was handling the knife, she noticed Sans staring at them from the sofa. At the knife. She thought she felt some sort of a pressure in the air and Sans’ left eye socket was flashing blue as the light in his left socket kept on disappearing. There were cyan droplets on his skull. His grin looked too stretched. She set the knife down.

“Sans…?”

Sans looked at her, suddenly scrunching his eyes shut for a second and looked back with his normal grin, his white eye lights returned. The pressure in the air was gone.

“yeah?”

“Are you o-”

“SANS, ARE YOU ALREADY BORED WITH THE HUMAN BOOK? SHOULD HAVE KNOWN THAT YOU COULD GET LAZY EVEN WHILE DILLY DALLYING!”

“nah, bro.  just wondering if you’re _cut_ for the level of cookin’ Elisa’s teachin’ ya.”

“THE GREAT PAPYRUS EXCELS IN EVERYTHING HE LEARNS!!”

“ya pap, i just like driving you _nuts_. it’s _knife_ to know you’re having a _grate thyme_.”

Elisa could swear he saw Papyrus’ eye sockets bulge with eye whites for a moment in a comical sense. He was shaking and she was expecting him to scream, when he suddenly stilled.

“WHATEVER YOU SAY, BROTHER. I DON’T _CARROT_ ALL. NYEH HEH HEH!”

She _knew_ Papyrus actually liked his brothers japes! Sans sputtered and started to laugh, pretending to swipe a tear off his eye socket.

“nice one, pap.”

She knew Sans was hiding something once again, but let it be and continued with their cooking lesson. She continued with how some things need to be also cooked like pasta so that they are edible, like some vegetables, all meats and eggs and there are multiple different ways of cooking aside from boiling. They practised the proper way to cook spaghetti, how to set the cooking temperature and time. Proper measurements of volume and weight were also practised. In the end they made spaghetti bolognese with onion, garlic, tomato sauce, mince meat, carrots, herbs, spices and parmesan cheese with a side of a salad. They sorted everything on the table dividing the kitchen and the living room and sat on the bar stools. She called Sans to eat too. Elisa made Papyrus taste the finished product.

“... WOWIE… I DIDN’T KNOW FOOD CAN TASTE SO GOOD!!”

“And you made it all by yourself! Human cooking is all about making the food taste good, as we can’t control do we taste something or not. And of course, the food needs to be nourishing and healthy, since we do not use magic to add to the taste or nutritional value. Oh! I have a gift for you.”

She got up and got to her bedroom, coming back with a book, with the title of ‘Quick and Easy Pasta: Master all 55 Recipes!’ and gave it to Papyrus.

“With this, you can try all sorts of different variations. If you just follow the directions carefully, you’ll do just as good or maybe even better food than today! I can help you find all the proper food preparation utensils needed. And once you get tired of pasta, there’s thousands of different kind of recipes.” Elisa smiled, but her smile dropped as she noticed that Papyrus was crying. Big, orange shaded tears dropped down his skull as he looked at the book silently.

“Papyrus, what’s wrong?”

Papyrus blinked, set the book aside and hugged her gently. Surprised, she hugged her back. _Did I do something wrong?!_ Papyrus sniffed and his voice was a bit rough.

“T-THANK YOU, ELISA. YOU ARE TOO KIND. THIS IS THE KINDEST THING SOMEONE NEW HAS DONE TO ME IN A LONG TIME. I’M OVERJOYED TO BE YOUR FRIEND.”

Elisa’s heart soared at his kind words and she hugged him tighter, laughing sincerely. She felt her eyes water.

“Papyrus I should be saying that! I am happy that you are my friend. All of you. I haven’t had friends, for…”

 _For too long._ But she didn’t say that. She pulled back to look at his face, smiling.

“I want to do everything so that you know how much I appreciate you. Now, let’s eat the food you cooked for us!”

Papyrus rubbed his eyes with his sleeve and grinned, so they turned back to the table. Elisa caught Sans looking at them both with a goofy smile, with large eye lights before he turned on his normal grin and turned back to his food. Elisa thought she saw something shining in his mouth. They ate in a comfortable silence for a while, Papyrus mumbling from time to time wondering how he hadn’t realized this was how he was supposed to be using his tongue all his life. Nobody reall told him, either?

“hey paps, this is really good. maybe she’s onto something. you could continue cooking like this.”

“I AGREE! BUT I THOUGHT YOU SAID MY EARLIER COOKING WAS GOOD, TOO?”

Elisa looked at Sans, wishing she could message him _‘now is a good time for you to come out clean’_ with her eyes _._ He seemed to get the point though, lowering his gaze.

“paps... i may not have been completely truthful with you.”

They waited in silence, so he was forced to continue.

“i... may have said your cooking was good just because i wanted you to be happy. you always seemed so joyful returning from undyne and happy serving the food you made, i never had the heart to say there’s anything wrong with it, heh, not that i have a heart anyways…” His voice trailed off and he cleared his non-existent throat, as the silence deepened. He looked at Papyrus now.

“either way. i’m sorry, papyrus, for lying to you. it wasn’t fair to you and i should’ve said something so you would’ve learned. i should’ve acted like elisa did on monday right from the beginning. i haven’t acted very big-brotherly.”

 _He’s the big brother?_ The silence continued as they looked at each other. Finally, Papyrus spoke.

“I HAD A HUNCH OF SOMETHING LIKE THAT.” Sans’ eye sockets widened, incredulously.

“w-what?”

“I HAVE LEARNED TO READ YOUR FACE CAREFULLY OVER THE YEARS, SANS. YOU HAVE CREATED A MASK THAT YOU WEAR ALMOST ALL THE TIME NOW. EVEN THOUGH I KNOW PART OF THE REASON, THERE IS CLEARLY STILL SOMETHING YOU ARE HIDING FROM ME. AND I’M STARTING TO SEE A PATTERN THAT INCLUDES MANY OTHER SMALL THINGS YOU HAVEN’T BOTHERED TO TELL ME.”

“papyru-”

“IT _HURTS_ , SANS. I’D MUCH RATHER BE SAD THAT YOU TOLD MY COOKING TASTED BAD OR ANYTHING ELSE YOU HAVE HIDDEN, IT WOULD HURT MUCH LESS THAN BEING LIED TO. I’M NOT MAD AT YOU, JUST DISAPPOINTED. I BELIEVE YOU CAN DO BETTER THAN THIS.”

Sans looked as if he was whiplashed at that and lowered his gaze again, grimacing. His eye sockets were empty. Elisa realized this might not be a discussion she should participate in, so she tried to give them some space by taking her plate to the sink and going to her bedroom.

 

She still could hear the conversation clearly, but then her phone started ringing.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh no he be mad ఠ_ఠ  
> But next chapter will be good I tell ya ( ͡° ͜ ʖ ͡° )


	9. Cooking Lesson: Part 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing... some tongues. ( ͡° ͜ ʖ ͡° )
> 
>  Chapter tags: Flashback, tongue touching, arousal
> 
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

_the morning had started up so well…_

Well, he'd shortcutted home in the early hours from work, tried to sleep and got up shortly after since a nightmare woke him up, sure, but her message had brightened his mood right away. He had give up trying to catch any more sleep and had continued watching at the sun rise. It had been his largest anchor for the last 3 years, seeing the sun, or if not that, then glancing at the sky from the window next to his bed. No matter how much he cursed the sunshine waking him up, he’d never cover the window.

Sooner or later they finally left for Elisa. Memories of yesterday were still a bit too fresh in his mind which made the meeting at the door awkward, or at least he thought so. He remembered how smooth her skin was and the pleasant small noise she’d made. But she of course didn’t remember that and hugged him warmly, her soul sending pleasant waves of contentment into his. Which made him blush just that much more. _are all hugs with her going to be like this now, too good to be true?_ She smelled nice. He’d kept his shield up but still had to control himself as she practically poured her heart out to him, thanking and apologising, sending him those refreshing waves of honesty that almost made him shiver. Her gentle caresses on his bones didn’t help the matter. _please, stop, i don’t deserve all this attention from you…_ But he wanted it all and couldn’t stop staring at her until she smiled at him again. He wanted to say something, crack a joke maybe, but could only agree to what she said and look away.

They finally went inside to see Papyrus being enthralled by her cats. It was endearing to see his brother so happy and made him regret them not getting any proper pets. But then again, Papyrus hadn’t asked for any. His soul lurched again when Elisa asked him about reading( _i really need to do something about getting scared out of my skin -heh- by simply being talked to_ ) and was pleasantly surprised by her large science book collection. The amount of degrees she had was questionable, he’d never asked her age, but she didn’t seem that old. The question died in his mind as he grabbed the quantum physics book. It wouldn’t hurt to see how similar their studies were.

He’d been reading, glad that the others didn’t see him sometimes close his eyes and yawn. He listened to them amusedly, as Papyrus went through his experiences with Undyne and Elisa patiently explained him all about proper cooking. He was shocked and promptly blushed when his brother presented his tongue to Elisa. Alright, tongue didn’t serve any bigger purpose to his brother and Elisa seemed to like it. _I wonder would she like mine- oh gods, stop_. He couldn’t let his mind wander like that, they were just friends! He forced himself to concentrate on the book. A lot of the theory was similar, some things were wrong as the humans weren’t aware of the magical aspect of the atoms’ building parts and attractive forces, but they were on the right track. He continued reading as he started hearing cutting sound that made his breath catch in his throat. He turned slowly, to see a knife gleaming in her hands.

_She entered the Judgement Hall, covered all over with grey dust, staining her hair, skin, clothes and small body. Her eyes flashed blood red. Her knife glimmered in the magical light as she grinned maliciously._

“Sans...?”

He realized his magic was starting to go unstable. He quickly controlled himself and grinned at Elisa, but the damage was done. He could feel confusion and worry flow from her soul. Luckily, his brother acted as a distraction and they continued their lesson. He wondered if he'll be fine around knifes ever again. The food was finally prepared and he was invited to the table. The way Elisa had made his brother emotional with her teaching and the gift made his soul flutter happily, especially when he felt her soul mirror his feeling. He could taste somewhat without his tongue, but he conjured it to taste the finished product better. It was good! He thought it would be a good idea to tell his brother so.

He regretted it immediately, as he had to then confess just to hear his brother had known all along. He’d known he’d been hiding his thoughts. They had the same history, but he didn’t know about what happened before they got free from Underground. No one else knew. They didn’t need to know. But clearly he hadn’t been good enough at hiding his constant fear. _what if it resets again somehow? does any of this matter? can i still truly trust this?_

"-... I BELIEVE YOU CAN DO BETTER THAN THIS.”

_His brother's skull lay on the cold, snowy ground, next to his dusty battle armor and scarf. He kept on talking, as a tiny boot stepped on his forehead.  
_

_"... EVEN IF YOU DON'T THINK SO! I... I PROMISE-"_

**_*crush*_ **

Sans grimaced and turned away.

_it wasn't real. this moment is real. it didn't happen. not this time._

“AND IT DOESN’T HURT ONLY ME… BUT YOU TOO. I DON’T WANT YOU TO CARRY ALL YOUR BURDENS BY YOURSELF. I WANT TO ALWAYS BE THERE FOR YOU, BROTHER, BUT YOU HAVEN’T ALLOWED ME TO.”

“you do more than enough just by being there! i… i didn’t want you to worry…”

He meant it. Papyrus had been the only reason he’d gotten out of bed in the morning for what it felt like years. Papyrus sighed and stood up.

“EXACTLY WHAT I MEANT. I WORRY EVEN MORE WHEN I DON’T KNOW WHAT’S GOING ON. EVEN IF IT WAS SOMETHING BIG, NO, _ESPECIALLY_ THEN, I’D GLADLY HELP YOU OUT ANY WAY I CAN, NO MATTER HOW SAD IT WOULD MAKE ME. BECAUSE IN ALL HONESTY, I’M TIRED OF SEEING HOW SAD, TIRED AND DESOLATE LOOKING YOU ARE ALL THE TIME.

Papyrus come to stand in front of Sans, who was still hunched down on his bar stool, not wanting to look at his brother. He flinched when Papyrus put his arm on his shoulder.

“WILL… Will you promise me to be more honest to me from now on? To at least try?”

He looked at his brother’s pleading face then. He supposed he could start telling him small things. About his nightmares, from both long ago and before the Barrier broke. He didn’t want to, but if it truly set his brother’s mind more at ease, he was ready to do it.

“yeah paps, i can promise that. i promise to try to talk to you more openly.”

Papyrus searched his eyes and face for a while and hugged him.

“THEN THIS IS SETTLED, APOLOGY ACCEPTED.”

They’d been getting better at being close and hugging through the years, as Sans felt less and less like he was going to lose him at any moment and felt safe doing it without feeling incredibly bitter. He knew Papyrus had missed their closeness. The hug was nice and calm. He noticed that Elisa was gone, maybe to give them space. He appreciated that. They broke off the hug.

“I’M GOING TO START DOING THE DISHES.”

“do you need help?”

Papyrus scoffed. “PLEASE NO, YOU LEAVE GREASE STAINS IN ALL OF THE DISHES.”

 _it’s not like the grease damages the damn things, you eat off of them just the same._ He sighed and moved away, letting his brother work. He considered returning to the book, when he heard Elisa talk hushed, but agitated. He went to peek at the bedroom door. She was talking to her phone with her back to him so he couldn’t see her face, but her soul told enough. It was fluttering out anxiety in similar way when they had first met. There was also some frustration. She didn’t like whatever they were discussing, he couldn’t understand  the discussion.

“Okei. Joo, äiti, nähää sitte. Heihei.” Her voice was strained. She closed the call and let out a small groan, slumping to sit on her bed. She opened a small drawer next to her, pulling out a yellow cylinder. There were _many_ similar looking cylinders. She quickly popped out a pill, swallowing it with a gulp of water from her night stand. She closed her eyes and just kept on breathing for a moment. He noticed her hands were shaking. He wanted to just go to her and hold her, craved it, but he knew he had to be a bit sneaky about this if he wanted answers. He knocked on the door. She jerked upright with a small peep and he felt bad since it had increased her anxiety with a jolt. She calmed down slightly but stayed tense as she saw Sans.

“may i come in?”

“Yes.” Her curt attitude surprised him. Her soul flared with frustration, so she was probably still upset about the phone call. His browbone rose, which she noticed.

“Sorry. Got a phonecall. Family matters.”

He didn’t ask her any further, but continued with his own plan.

“so.” He looked at his left hand’s fingers, calmly. “i have a proposition.”

“What kind?” Her curiosity woke up. _good_.

“considering yesterday’s promise… how about we move about it with question to question-style? if the other doesn’t want to answer the question, they can pass it and answer another one. we can start small.”

Her curiosity stayed up but the anxiety was still there, strong. “you can start. ask anything you wish. paps is doing the dishes, it’s just the two of us.”

She licked her lips. “How did the talk with your brother go?”

“good. promised him i’d try to be more honest from now on, and i meant it. he forgave me.”

“That’s good.” She looked and felt relieved. “I felt a bit guilty, it felt like I had put you into that situation…”

“don’t. even if you did, it was a good thing. my turn.” He thought of some simple, innocent question. “what’s the wooden room in the bathroom?”

“That’s a sauna. My father built it a long time ago, it fits 2 people. It’s meant for a steam bath that makes you sweat and relax.”

Huh. Some human bathing thing then, alright. “your turn. remember, anything.”

“I saw you grab a master level quantum physics book and read it seemingly with ease. You also said you helped maintain the CORE. How come you’re a night guard instead of a high-paid engineer?”

The question surprised him. She was very attentive. He hesitated for a while. “maintaining the core had been one of my old jobs in the underground. there was a big accident that i have bad memories of. haven’t been much into science ever since.” There. A true answer that still doesn’t tell everything. She seemed pleased with it.

“Thank you, even answering that much must’ve been difficult. I’m still planning to try to turn your head around about your career though, but later.” She smiled and her soul felt slightly mischievous. _you’ll turn my head around, huh?_ “Your turn.”

“what are those fresh wounds on your knuckles and feet? i saw some older scars too, yesterday.”

Her soul dimmed at that. He’d known asking questions might hit a bad spot, but it still felt horrible witnessing it. He immediately wanted to apologise and make her forget the whole thing just to make her soul shine again, but he waited. She started at the wall for a while and then nodded as if to herself, renounced.

“I trained too hard. I don’t spar, but I have a punching bag. Similar thing as with the running. I felt the urge to do it for as long as I could. To maintain… stress. The old wounds come from training too.” She sounded and felt honest, but it was clear the message hid so much more. But she’d answered.

“right. your turn.”

“What did you do earlier, when we were cooking? Your eye had flashed blue and I felt some sort of pressure in the air. You were staring at my direction.”

He was expecting this question and was not about to answer it. Not now, at least. “no comment. ask something else, please.”

“Alright, alright… Can you also make tongue, like your brother?”

He’d expected this question too. It still didn’t stop him from blushing and he couldn’t will it away.

“y-yeah, i can.”

“Can i see it?” Her curiosity was soon overwhelming her anxiety, which he thought was a good thing. It was nice to see he could distract her from her negative emotions. He hadn’t expected to do it like this, though.

“if you answer a question.”

“Alright.”

“what were all those bottles in your night drawer?” Her face stayed plain, as usual but her soul lurched again, harder this time. Her soul pulsed with slight irritation and much anxiety.

“You were peeping at me.”

“i’m sorry, i had come looking for you and happened to see. you don’t need to answer if you don’t want to. buut…” He knew it was a dirty move, but he tapped his teeth with his distal phalanges. _answer this to quench your curiosity._

She huffed, but answered, looking downwards. “I have… illnesses. Not physical ones, but mental ones. One being anxiety, you’ve seen how bad it can get. The medication helps me cope every day, but it has side effects, that need their own medication. One side effect is migraine, that you saw, too.”

Her hands had started to shake again and she was gripping them tightly. Sans felt awful, he knew he’d caused that to her by asking. Her soul was anxious and nervous. _To think that the horrible migraine he’d witnessed was a side effect to medication… it must be something highly potent, then._

“Is it… fine with you?” She asked quietly, looking at her knees. He blinked and realized she was nervous _because of him. What he might think._ His answer came immediately.

“of course it’s fine! whatever pills you pop doesn’t define who you are. if they help you live, though _stars above_ it sounds horrible to need a drug that gives you migraine, then don’t ever feel ashamed about it.” He went to touch her shoulder. “it doesn’t make me see you any differently, your illnesses or the medication.”

She looked at him then, her eyes wide open. There was a feeling of wonder bursting out of her soul, with happiness, overpowering her anxiety for a while. It felt amazing, even with his shield. “Thank you. It was hard to say out loud. But you convinced me.”

Sans felt his nervousness come back with his blush as he sat on the bed next to her.

“so, as promised…”

His left eye lost it’s light and the right one flashed a blue ring for a moment as he opened his jaw and conjured his tongue out. It looked similar to Papyrus’, just that it was cyan colored. Her eyes glimmered as she stared at it without shame. Wonder, now mixed with burning curiosity, took control of her soul. He was satisfied to get rid of the anxiety she felt, but wasn’t ready for what was coming.

“C-can I touch it?!”

_**oh, gods.** _

The thought of her fingers on his tongue made him shiver and blush even further. She noticed and backed up a bit on the bed.

“Sorry, it’s just so pretty and I got horribly curious since I’ve never seen anything like that except for your brother’s and it looks see-through and shiny and I was wondering how it feels and is it wet and does it move and how does it even work-” She gasped in breath, blushing. She looked and felt mortified and he had to chuckle at that. She calmed herself down, still looking at his tongue.

“I’m sorry, I got way too excited. It is really pretty. Would you like to touch mine, if you’re curious? Or- OhnothatsoundedhorriblywrongandcreepyI’msosorry-” She was about to get off the bed to walk away covering her face in shame as he grabbed her arm gently. His mouth was closed now. He had to admit, he was curious, too. He’d shaped his tongue according to how humans’ looked like, but he didn’t know how it actually feels.

“that’s a good idea. can i go first, though? my bones are clean.”

She sat down. Her shame just disappeared and she didn’t seem to feel any shyness or embarrassment. Just that… burning curiosity and eagerness. “Okay!” She smiled and opened her mouth wide after she swallowed.

_oh, stars, is this really happening?_

He got to it before his nerves would fail him. He reached out his index distal phalange to touch her tongue. It felt warm, slightly uneven with tiny bumps and very slimy. So saliva wasn’t all just water then. He moved his finger around, adding another one to prod more. She giggled a bit. At least one of them isn’t nervous out of their minds. She lifted the tongue up, inviting him to feel the underside too. It was smoother and there was a tight fold holding the tongue down. The bottom of her mouth was filled with saliva. He pinched the tongue gently, making her giggle more. She suddenly tensed the tongue, making it much thicker and tougher. _right, it’s a muscle which contracts._ He took his fingers away. He had to fiercely focus on keeping his mind empty of any extra thought. He’d have time to freak out later, he just needed to get out of this without letting his magic flare out because of nervousness and gods know what else.

“thank you, that was actually interesting. your t-turn.”

He couldn’t stop the stutter and just opened his mouth, closing his eyes. He thought he couldn’t possibly handle both her prodding his tongue _and_ her watching him in that way. With _passion_. He flinched slightly as he finally felt her finger on his tongue and resisted a moan.

 _this was such a bad/wonderful idea._ The thoughts seemed to clash in his mind.

His tongue was more sensitive than he’d remembered. He didn’t use it often, just sometimes to taste better and it conjured itself out when he was having a… _private_ moment. He’d only touched it when he first discovered it a long time ago, really. In other words, her finger felt _way too good_ as she moved it around, adding two more. They tasted like her scent had smelled when he had hugged her. _Part of her was on one of his sensitive organs right now._ His whole face was flushed now and he tried his best not to whine or breathe hard. He didn’t really even need to breathe, he knew, but concentrating on anything at all was fucking difficult right now. He lulled his tongue further out and opened his eye sockets slightly. She looked just mesmerized, curious and giddy, her soul mirroring her face. She didn’t seem to notice his predicament, as she got more and more courageous with her fingers. He realized he’d started to form saliva of his own, after feeling it on her tongue. Hopefully her fingers wouldn’t get too messy.

Suddenly all of her fingers wrapped loosely around his tongue, massaging it gently, applying more pressure.

_“ahhnn!”_

_fuck._

Magic in his right eye manifested completely, wisping cyan through his closed eye and they were surrounded with his pulsating magic. His bones hummed and all his joints were glowing. He felt a bulge forming in his pants but he was finally able to will it away, slowly gathering his provoked magic and forcing it all back down, groaning. He pulled his tongue back in his mouth, letting it fade away and opened his eyes, panting shakily. He noticed he was grabbing her arm tight and pulled away. She looked mortified again.

“I-I’m sorry, did I hurt you?! It just felt so nice and tingly against my skin, I shouldn’t have touched it so much!” She sounded truly panicky, so after a few deep breaths Sans could finally gulp and answer.

“no, didn’t hurt. the complete opposite.”

She looked confused. He looked away, still heavily blushing and scratched the back of his neck.

“it’s, ah… well, my tongue, it’s… all focused magic in one spot into a physical form and… it’s rather sensitive. i forgot about that, it’s not your fault. it just felt too good, that’s all.”

It finally seemed to dawn to her and her eyes opened wide, as if they wanted to bulge out. Her whole face flushed red.

“OhmygodI’msosorryIdidn’tmeanto!”

She stood up and covered her mouth with her hands, one still covered fully with his cyan saliva. The sight made him shudder.

“You should’ve told me Sans, I never meant to be so intrusive!” Her soul felt absolutely bewildered and her anxiety was rising again. Her eyes were watering. He stood up too, though his knees were shaking and grabbed her arms gently.

“elisa, it’s okay! like i said, i forgot. and i promised, after all. you just literally had me _tongue-tied_ for a while.” He tried to smile calmingly to her, even if he still felt rather delirious about it all. She gave out a small, distraught laugh.

“look... how about we stop the questions for today, calm down, go get some tea or something and return to paps? think he’s still humerus-deep in dishes. then we can either go home or if you’ll have us, we can still think of something to do. do you watch movies?”

She blinked. “I, well, no, but… Y-yeah. We can watch something.” He let her arms go.

“good. i ah, suggest that you wash your fingers. and face. they’re, um… covered with my... “

She finally glanced her hand and was startled slightly by the cyan saliva. She let out a tiny ‘eep’ and rushed into the bathroom. He let out one more shaky sigh and walked tensely back into the kitchen, finally willing his stubborn blush down. His magic was still very volatile and he’d have to spend some minutes calming it down.

He went to search if she had any ketchup.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh boy oh boy oh boy (〃∀〃)ゞ
> 
> Oh and Elisa says in the phone: "Okay. Yeah, mom, we'll see each other then. Byebye."


	10. Cooking Lesson: Part 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing sleepy Sans, bone exploration, srs talk, massages... oh my!
> 
> Chapter tags: Safe fodder!
> 
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

Elisa was washing her hands and face frantically while trying to catch her breath. _Why didn’t he make me stop and tell me I was accidentally arousing him?!!_ She’d been so excited, _a magical thing_ that she was allowed to touch, questions had just been swirling in her mind as she was prodding the smooth, warm, beautiful colored tongue. At some point it had started to excrete a thick, translucent, cyan substance on her fingers that she now knew to be his saliva and together with his tongue it felt so _interesting_ on her hand. It was like her skin was getting tiny electric shocks all over in a pleasant way. Too late she had noticed how he was breathing heavier and his whole face had been all blue, as she had already grabbed his bigger-than-normal tongue to give it a squeeze. At the same time she’d managed to massage it slightly.

At his sudden moan she’d felt that weird pressure fill the room. It was similar to the one she’d felt earlier, but as the earlier one felt ominous, this one felt… stimulating? All her hair on her body had stood up, her breathing and heart rate fastened and she had started to sweat. Cyan wisps bursted out of the crack of his right eye socket and the joins she saw were colored cyan. The whole skeleton was glowing, under his clothes. It was beautiful to see, when she thought about it later. He’d grabbed her arm painfully and was panting and shivering. As soon as it had happened, it calmed down just as quickly as he groaned and seemed to control himself. He’d apologised and explained the situation and how it wasn’t her fault, but still…

She wouldn’t know anything about arousal. She’d studied sex and relationships out of curiosity, she knew how things worked, but aside from her extremely intrusive dreams she had never felt even a hint of libido inside her. Whenever she’d thought about masturbation, as if it would be an scientific experiment, her mind would go blank and soon she’d be doing something else. She was starting to suspect she was asexual and aromantic in some sort of twisted way. She was sure she should’ve felt _something_ more with his magical outburst, but she’d only felt horrified and confused, afraid she’d hurt him somehow.

She finished washing herself and took a deep breath. _He hadn’t meant it, his terrified face told enough as he was trying to calm himself down._ He’d seemed extremely distraught, looking anywhere except her, all blue and sweating cyan droplets on his forehead. Still he had made an effort to calm _her_ down, as if she’d been the one to suddenly go out of control.

At least she didn’t feel anxious. She wasn’t sure was it because of Sans or the drug she took after the phone call, but she was thankful about that for now either way. Her mother had called her to invite her over on Sunday evening. She knew perfectly well what for, but accepted grudgingly. She knew her mother only meant well, trying to introduce her to her stepfather better, but she always just felt distressed around the man. She wished she knew why, he had seemed nice enough and her mother seemed happy with him. She pushed the phone call out of her mind to join the brothers back in the living room.

Papyrus had finished the dishes( _he shouldn’t have done them in the first place, he’s a guest!_ ) and was chatting with Sans on the sofa about his new book. They were both scratching a cat, which had found their way on their bony laps. They seemed comfortable laying on their femurs. Sans seemed calm again, but she knew now how good he was at pretending. She went to them and plastered some sort of a smile on her face, hoping to look confident.

“Well! It’s not horribly late yet and if you guys don’t have anything else to do today, you’re welcome to stay longer. I like your company. We can either continue eating spaghetti, or order some take-out later. Sans suggested watching a movie…?”

“OH! CAN WE WATCH THE ANIMATED MOVIE ABOUT ACTUAL LIVING EMOTIONS?!”

She sat on the right side of the sofa, Sans was in the middle and Papyrus on the left side. They found the movie he meant and put it on. It was a generic children’s movie but Elisa had to admit, it was a nice, fresh idea and it looked good. She really didn’t watch movies or other such entertainment. They didn’t rouse emotions in her and only rarely she felt surprised by the plot. She did enjoy Papyrus’ reactions much more. She looked at him always when he ‘OOH’d and ‘AAH’d when something new appeared, or grabbed the couch pillows when something exciting happened.

The next time she looked at Papyrus, amused as he had squeaked at something happening on the screen, she noticed that Sans’ eyes were closed and his head was leaning on the sofa. Maybe those dark circles around his eye sockets meant that he was tired, though he hadn’t shown it otherwise. His grin looked relaxed now, his teeth covered more by his malleable cheek bones. He looked calm, an expression Elisa realized she’d never seen on the skeleton’s face. He always seemed to force a seemingly relaxed grin, never letting it falter. He looked beautiful like this and she was reminded of that short moment when his body was glowing in his stimulated state. Smiling, she leaned away to grab a thin, blue blanket she had laying on the armchair next to the sofa, but when she straightened back, his head started to fall and landed softly on her shoulder. _Welp, no move moving for me_. She thought she should feel embarrassed, panicked, shy, or something, especially after what happened in the bedroom, but she just kept on feeling content. _This is nice_ , and it felt good how someone could feel this comfortable and relaxed around her.

She slowly wrapped the blanket around him, careful not to move his skull. She relaxed again studied him. His breath was warm, calm and slow like human’s, even though she still couldn’t fathom a skeleton breathing. His skull felt heavier than a normal skull would. Hiw brow bones twitched and he made tiny noises in his sleep. His body felt warm against hers, as he was now completely relaxed on her side. His hand was peeking out of the blanket and Elisa’s curiosity flared again. This time however, she wanted to make sure she won’t be doing something inappropriate.

“Papyrus?” She talked softly.

“YES?” He turned to look at them from the screen and his excited face softened immediately at the sight.

“Can I touch his hand? I want to look at it close, but I don’t know is it… sensitive or something.”

Papyrus smiled gently, and talked surprisingly quietly. “Go ahead, just don’t scratch anywhere nor touch between his arm bones, such spots are tender.”

She picked his hand slowly, taking the blanket off his arm. He had taken his hoodie off before they started watching the movie, so she could see the arm bones too. His finger bones were thick like she remembered, but not as thick as human’s fingers. The heads of the metacarpals were slightly fused together while there were still thin holes in between. The metacarpal of the thumb was loose without any support, but it didn’t bend far away from the rest of the hand when she tried gently. She pulled on his index finger gently, wondering how on earth the bones stuck together. She recognized the joint cartilage between the bones, but that wasn’t enough. There were no muscles to move the bones,  no tendons to help and restrict the bones’ movement. She thought she saw some blue color swirling in the joints for a millisecond. She started to feel more and more frustrated when the answer to all of her questions seemed to simply be _magic_. She got a feeling that she’d have to join Dr. Alphys’ lectures once she started teaching.

She caressed the bones slowly and gently, feeling the smooth and rough spots. She felt along all the phalanges, carpals and lastly radius and ulna, careful not to touch the inner side. Sans hummed gently in his sleep and Elisa decided to stop, afraid to rouse him. She set the hand down, covering it with the blanket again. She felt accomplished, having satisfied her curiosity( _to a certain extent!_ ) without waking him up. He looked as calm as before. She head a camera shutter sound effect and saw that Papyrus had taken a picture of them with his phone. It had surprised her, but didn’t bother her. He grinned while putting his phone away.

“You are the first human I have seen to show that level of gentleness to a monster.” Papyrus’ tone was soft, but serious in a way she hadn’t heard from him before.

“What do you mean?”

“When humans have been curious of monsters instead of afraid, they usually tend to be too... straightforward and rude.” Papyrus looked away scrunching his brow bones together and looked hesitant, as if he didn’t want to admit what he was saying. “They come too close, ask questions demandingly, touch without permission…” He looked back at her. ”You have been the complete opposite. No wonder my brother has taken a liking to you.”

Elisa was surprised. Again, she couldn’t believe that she was the only human to treat these kind-hearted monsters as equals. It really wasn’t that hard, was it?

“I like him too. But I like all of you, you have been nothing but kind to me.”

Papyrus shook his skull. “No, Elisa. He is always composed and guarded. But when someone talks about you… I see his mask break the most then, and around you. I have never seen him show that much emotion about anything.”

As if called, Sans wrapped his arms around Elisa’s waist, nuzzling his face in her neck, mumbling happily in his sleep.  Elisa froze for a moment, looking first at him, then at Papyrus, who was desperately stifling his giggles behind his hands before calming down again, smiling fondly at the sight.

“I have never seen him this relaxed before anywhere else than our house either, and we have lived together all our lives. Sure, he naps everywhere since he is a lazybones but never this calm. He has been more lively around the house when he usually shuts himself in his room, just appearing sometimes to eat. I think it is you who has this good effect on him, and I hope he will do right by you as you have with him…”

Elisa’s cheeks heated up as she realized how serious Papyrus was. Did she truly have this much of an effect on Sans? It felt like he was giving her way too much credit. She was no one special. Her heart skipped a beat as Papyrus continued.

“... Elisa, I think he likes you more than as a friend.”

She felt that tiny, warm, weird feeling inside her leap a little harder again, but it was quickly stifled by self-doubt and sadness. Shabby memories of the last and only time she’d tried to even date someone came to her, not to mention her nonexistent romantic feelings in the first place. _This wouldn’t do_. If Papyrus was right, he wanted her, the one thing she wouldn’t truly be able to give him. It felt bittersweet. Sans hugged her waist tighter for a moment. She sighed and had a lopsided smile as she stared into a wall, wringing her hands together.

“I’m delighted if I can make someone happy… but I’m unfortunately not good relationship material. I think I won’t do right by anyone in that aspect.”

“Nonsense. You have a kind, good soul, every monster can see that and that is all your need. It is sad if no human can.”

Papyrus said it so matter-of-factly that she had to look at him. He just smiled brightly and turned back to the movie. What did he mean by that? Sure, she was doing her all for these new friends she got but that doesn’t surely mean everyone can see it, not to mention a ‘soul’. She didn’t ask him anything further though and tried to find more comfortable position to tend to both her and Sans. The position they had now was uncomfortable; His hard jawbone was resting on her shoulder and his steady, warm breath floated to her neck, which tickled. The top of his humerus poked her arm and his arm bones were hard behind her back. Afraid of waking him up, she just lowered herself a bit on the sofa to relieve her back and accepted her fate as a pillow as they finished the movie. And watched the next one that Papyrus chose. And the next one.

 

/ / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /

 

Sans was having the most wonderful set of dreams. He didn’t remember the last time he’d had an even remotely good dream. Content emotions were flowing through his soul and he was indulging himself to the fullest. Happy dreams and memories came to him in waves.

Memory of their first Christmas; how Papyrus had found, cleaned and fixed him his first blue hoodie from the garbage dump.

Dream of bathing in a full tub of ketchup.

Memory of them building Papyrus’ battle armor for the costume party, how his eyes had sparkled at the finished product.

Dream of napping whole two interrupted days in a row. _heh. leave it to me to dream about napping._

Memory of seeing the sun for the first time.

Dream of how he would race his brother and his red convertible with a tricycle and win.

Memory of Elisa tasting Toriel’s food, how incredible that had felt.

Dream of Elisa hugging him with the same enthusiasm as with Papyrus.

The _very fresh_ memory of Elisa touching his tongue.

Dream of Elisa touching his naked bones in that same, gentle manner.

_okay, this train of thought is taking a wrong turn._

Memory of Elisa’s pained face at her front door.

The memory wouldn’t change. Her face and voice started to get more distorted. Her whimper turned into screaming.

_well, this is even worse._

Finally, Sans realized he was waking up, eyes still closed. He felt warm, relaxed and comfortable. _have i ever woken up feeling this good?_ Some movie was still playing in the background. His hands were wrapped around something soft and warm. His head was leaning against something hard and… moving? He heard and felt a steady, calm beat and nuzzled his cheek bone against it. Her scent was pleasant.

 _wait..._ **_her_ ** _scent?_

He opened his eyes slowly. His skull was laying against her sternum and her chin was leaning against the back of his skull. His hands were wrapped around her hip, binding her arms onto her lap.

He thought his soul would freeze still from shock. He thought he possibly couldn’t blush anymore than before. He was very wrong.

He realized where those strong emotions that had fueled his dreams came from. They weren’t his, but hers. He was glued right next to her- actually, on her-, right on top of her soul and his soul was completely defenseless. His soul was surrounded and filled with her contentment and calmness, but there was a small uncomfortable thorn of a feeling that probably woke him up. If she’d felt any stronger emotions he could’ve been easily overwhelmed and who knew what would’ve happened then. He quickly formed his shield back and started to ascend off her chest.

Sans slowly pulled himself to sit straight, removing his hands. He watched at Elisa warily as she was staring at the wall, face plain, seeing nothing. He was about to nudge her as she appeared to be pulled out of her thoughts by his stirring. Her soul pulsed with happiness and amusement.

“Oh, hello there sleepyhead.” She said and smiled.

“i- i’m so sorry, elisa, i shouldn’t have fallen asleep on you-”

“Shh, it’s fine. I didn’t have the heart to wake you up.” She slowly got up and started stretching. Sans looked around him, noting that Papyrus was gone. Elisa's cats had taken his spot, curled up into fluffy balls. He checked the time from his phone. They’d been in that position all afternoon, for hours.

“where’s paps?”

“He said he didn’t want to stay sitting for such long times and I didn’t want to wake you up so I suggested he takes a walk in the park nearby. He should be back soon, we can order something for dinner.”

Sans groaned, desperate. “seriously elisa, this is embarrassing. you should’ve woken me up or at  least moved me off. i didn’t want to hold you down like a body pillow or something.”

“Again, I truly didn’t mind. It was nice. You look much better than in the morning. I think the sleep did you good!”

He _did_ feel great. He didn’t remember resting this well, ever. He stretched his bones, making the joints pop. She was massaging her shoulders and neck now, moving around in the apartment. The small prickle of uncomfort was still there.

“You want tea? You suggested it, uh, earlier.”

“yeah, thank you, let me help.” They went to the kitchen. Elisa summoned some mugs and a variety of teas while Sans filled the electric water cooker. He tried to do small talk to cover the silence that felt awkward to him, rubbing his neck vertebrae.

“so... while i was snoozing away, what did you guys watch?”

“I let him browse my Netflix and choose whatever, I think it was more animated movies. I was… spacing out, most of the time. And… “ A small bite of guilt came from her soul.

“yes?”

“... I asked Papyrus for permission, but I suppose I should’ve asked you. I studied your hand and arm while you were sleeping. I was careful not to do anything weird. Isthatokaywithyou?” Guilt and embarrassment throbbed from her soul as she waited for his answer. He looked at her, dumbfounded and started laughing. She looked confused.

“we’re both sorta weird, huh? i studied your arm when you were passed out on thursday. so i suppose we’re even. i’m okay with it if you’re okay.”

She sighed, relieved, clearly not bothered by what he told him. “I’m not bothered in the slightest. Found anything interesting?”

Sans didn’t feel like telling her how mesmerized he’d been by her skin.

“nah. it was just funny to note how squishy you are around your bones. you’re held together with so much more… stuff. how ‘bout me?”

She was silent for a few moments. She was practically oozing curiosity and restraint. “It was very interesting, examining your arm. I’m glad it was okay for me to do.”

“c’mon, i know you wanna say something about it. hit it. i won’t bite.”

As if flood opening, she started to speak. She had that far-away look in her eyes again, not seeing what was really in front of her.

“I just found your arm very fascinating. It’s warm, heavier than a usual bones are, it’s held together by something more than just joints and the structure and thickness are different than human’s would be. But the texture was similar to what I know. Papyrus said I shouldn’t scratch anywhere or touch between your radius and ulna, so that much mean your bones are sensitive to touch.”

Sans felt his blush forming. He was able to will it down. But she continued.

“Not only your arm but your w-whole body! You radiate warmth, you seem to breathe and I felt warm air coming out, your skull felt much heavier than it should, your bones dug into my skin more than when you hug me so something is different when you’re asleep, you make sounds though supposedly you have no vocal chords, it’s just... “

She abruptly grabbed his hands in her own and looked at his eyes. He swore hers were sparkling.

“I realized I only knew to answer all my questions with ‘magic’ and it’s so frustrating! Sans, your whole existence is a mystery to me and it’s so very exciting.”

She was smiling so broadly and her soul was in a frenzy with eagerness and curiosity. Sans couldn’t hold his blush down anymore, nor was he able to say anything. He wasn’t used to attention or admiration, not to mention in this quantity. Suddenly she grimaced, blushed and her soul was flooded with embarrassment.

“I got carried away again, didn’t I?” “She let his hands go and groaned, hiding her face in her hands. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you feel like… like a science experiment or something. You’re just another person, just like me, and it’s rude of me being this nosy. That’s why I don’t talk, I just spew all my stupid thoughts out at once…”

He took her hands gently and had a lopsided smile on his face. “elisa, stop. are we gonna have this discussion every time? toriel told ya already you are free to ask questions. we know you mean well. yer just making me flustered with all this attention, i’m not worth it. not to mention you’re just as interesting to me.”

“But you have all the possible books about human anatomy easily at hand. I’m not that hard to figure out.”

Sans realized he’d said the last phrase out loud and sputtered, trying to figure out something to cover it up. He felt a surge of that uncomfortable feeling from Elisa’s soul though, and she closed her eyes, wincing a bit, massaging one of her shoulders.

“hey, are you alright?”

“Yeah, just got a headache.”

Sans’ eyelights contracted into pinpricks. He had wanted distraction, but not this. “you’re not having another migraine are you? should i call toriel and-”

“No! No. This is just a normal headache. My muscles have been cramped all day because of, you know, yesterday. I’ll just take a painkiller and sleep on it.”

“is there anything i can do to help?”

“Not really. A massage would help, I’ll reserve a time for tomorrow.”

“i could give it a try, if you let me. i’ve seen alphys massage undyne sometimes, how hard could it be?”

“Well… Alright, if you really want to. Let me go change to a better shirt.”

She went to her bedroom while he finished preparing the tea. She came back, wearing a black noodle strap top. She didn’t seem to care about showing the scratches from yesterday.

Sans tried his best not to stare at her clavicles.

They took their teas on the coffee table in front of the sofa. Elisa sat cross-legged on the floor between his legs setting her hands on her lap while he sat on the sofa. She moved the straps off her shoulders.

Sans succeeded not choking on his own magic.

He’d seen a lot of human females in barely any clothing in videos, pictures and at the street during summer, but seeing _her_ do _that_ made his soul do flips. She explained him how he’d need to feel for the muscles underneath the skin and how to move them to release the tension. He made sure his fingers were magically covered to make them softer. If Elisa noticed, she didn’t mention it. Sans focused on his work, following her instructions on where to press or slide his padded phalanges.

“Nnh…”

A small, pleasant sounding sigh escaped her mouth, very much like he’d heard on Friday evening while prodding her arm. He really should’ve thought twice before offering his help. _This amount of stimulus per day can’t be healthy._ At least he was behind her and she couldn’t see the deepening cyan on his face. His fingers twitched, but he concentrated on keeping his breathing and voice level.

“i’m not hurting you, am i?”

“No, you’re getting the hang of it. It feels good. Try to get under the scapulas, please. There’s the most tense spots.” She sounded and her soul and posture felt more relaxed.

Sans became hyperaware of how her pale skin was reddening and warming up from his touches. How he could be so close to her, seeing all her neck, shoulders and some of her upper torso, including those teasing clavicles. How his tibias sometimes brushed against her arms. How he had free reign on touching the top of her clavicles, spine and scapulae. He was enthralled by the feeling of how her muscles moved under her skin as he squeezed them. He felt felt guilty pleasure when he pressed a harder spot in a right way and made her do those wondrous little noises again. As long as he wasn’t the one being touched, he could keep his voice and magic in control just fine.

He still had to remind himself that this was just an innocent massage to relieve her headache, no matter how Sans felt about it. Even if she was highly interested in his body- the thought deepened his blush- she wasn’t interested in him in that way. One, they’d known each other for only a week and two, Sans was sure no one would ever want to be romantic with him. He was just some lazy, good-for-nothing skeleton who never did anything right. _i couldn't protect anyone_. She’d be more likely to be attracted to his cool, joyous brother. _if skeletons even were her thing_. Most likely she was only into humans, anyways. He decided he should stop dreaming about stupid, hopeless things and just focus on finding more tense muscles. Elisa put her hand on his after a while.

“Okay, that’s enough. Thank you, Sans, I feel much better already. I’ll put something warmer on to keep the muscles warm.”

She smiled broadly at him, her soul shining with happiness and appreciation as she stood up and went to the bedroom. He managed out a quiet "uhuh" instead of proper words of acknowledgement. Truly, the uncomfortable feeling wasn’t there anymore and Sans felt extremely accomplished. He’d managed to actually make her feel good without any backlash for once.

At that moment, Papyrus rang the doorbell, returning from his walk. Sans silently thanked the stars that he didn’t arrive 5 minutes earlier. They welcomed him and Elisa, now clothed in the turtleneck again, ordered some thai food, making sure they were okay with something spicy. Anything with noodles was good for Papyrus. They ate in good spirits and Papyrus chatted happily about his walk, the movies they’d(well, he’d) watched and teased Sans about him falling asleep on Elisa. Elisa simply chuckled as Sans tried to hide himself in his hoodie. Papyrus made Elisa keep the leftovers of the food they’d made for lunch and they together decided to have weekly cooking lessons. Sans was welcome too to stay and read, of course. Sans hinted that they might want to departure for the evening, having taken quite much of Elisa’s time(even if she denied it) so the skeleton brothers finally hugged her goodbye and left for home.

Sans told Papyrus that he still felt quite tired and would already call it a night, going to his room. He wasn’t lying, even if he’d had the best sleep in ages practically laying on Elisa, he was still tired. He always was. But he went to lay on his bed, not to fall asleep, but to stare at the ceiling, letting his mind wander to the events of the day.

His face flushed fully, he grabbed a pillow and screamed into it frustratedly.

 

/ / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / / /

 

Elisa felt better than in ages. The day was a success in a multitude of ways. She felt more confident in her friendship with the skeleton brothers, and more confident about herself. Anxiety was a mere memory. Only thing that bothered her(excluding the tongue incident) was how she’d lost time when they were sitting on the sofa. At one moment she’d been idly watching at the movie, the next Papyrus had told her he needed to move his limbs. As she’d suggested a walk, she noticed that multiple hours had passed without her noticing, only feeling the numbness setting in her legs. Then, in a blink of an eye it felt, Sans was awake and she’d lost another bunch of time, according to the clock on the wall. She wondered had she zoned out more during the day when they were visiting. Or did she do something without her knowing. They hadn’t said anything, so probably no. Hopefully so.

She pushed the discouraging thoughts out of her mind, focusing on the nice memories of the day as she sat down on the sofa again. The nice food. Papyrus’ reaction to the gift. The bittersweet feeling Papyrus made her feel. Sans’ various reactions throughout the day. She just found him beautiful when his grin faltered into something else. _Especially with that deep cyan blush_ , she thought and chuckled. She planned to read a while longer before heading to bed. Her phone buzzed in her pocket. Someone was calling her from a number she didn’t recognize. She despised phone calls, especially from strangers. She was pondering should she answer or not. _It isn’t that late_ , she supposed, and answered the call.

“Elisa Aarre on the phone.”

“Howdy! This is Asgore Dreemurr. You may know me as the King of Monsters, but please, Asgore is fine. I suppose my w- _Toriel_ met you last week? She said only good things about you, telling you may be able to help with something. Would you like to meet someday for a nice cup of tea?”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aw shieeeeet the big man called, what he want


	11. Righteousness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing Asgore's crib, Elisa's determination and politics
> 
> Chapter tags: Safe fodder!
> 
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

Elisa, dazed, agreed on meeting Asgore the next morning for a nice cup of tea at 10 o’clock at his residence on the root of the mountain. He wouldn’t let her call him anything else than his first name. She finished the call calmly and politely, finally dropping the phone from her lax hand.

She was going to meet His Majesty Asgore Dreemurr.

 _The King of all Monsters called_ **_her_ ** _directly for a cup of tea._

She started hyperventilating with her chest aching painfully and promptly lost consciousness.

She regained her awareness after one hour, slightly calmer. Everything seemed to be in order. She’d have to ask her neighbour did she hear anything out of ordinary.

She spent the second hour calming herself down further, sitting down with some white tea. The panic attack came and went so she didn’t bother medicating herself or considering mind exercises. _Why did I agree for tomorrow?!!_ She started fretting all over again. What on earth did he want from him? She’d told Toriel she wanted to help but that was it. She’d clearly been waaaayyy over her head with this whole thing. Surely His Highness got enough help from humans to take care of the bureaucratic business? She could give her scientific perspective and she had basic information about multiple other things but she was not trained for politics, law or other such topics. She simply couldn’t fathom why he would call a stranger over only because Toriel (his ex-wife?) said a few nice things about her.

She huffed. She didn’t know any better nor had she asked. It would be rude to call and ask anyone for advice, she thought. She hated not being able to prepare, the feeling of ineptitude ired her. She felt enough of that and tried her everything to always maintain control. But now there was nothing to be done. _I’ll just have to walk into the lion’s den and see what happens…_ She went to bed and fell asleep surprisingly fast.

The next morning she became aware of standing in her living room, fully clothed and stomach full. It was 8 o’clock. The cats seemed to be tended for. She went to look at herself in her bedroom. She was showered, her hair was put up into a neat bun and she seemed to have some light makeup on. She’d never bought nor used makeup, but some had appeared in her apartment and kept on appearing on the night table even when she stuffed it in the lowest drawer. Additionally she had a dark violet collared button-up shirt, silver cross necklace she’d gotten from her mother, black, pleated pants and classy, brown lace-up flats. Clearly a part of her wanted her to look her best, and she agreed wholeheartedly for once. She sighed. _Go with the flow_. She again had no time to prepare anything to bring with her and she had no more sweets, so she took out a loaf of rye bread and pulla she’d baked some time ago from her freezer and put them into a bag. It’s better than nothing, she supposed. She put on a thin, grey wool jacket, blue cotton scarf and black leather gloves and left the apartment, planning to go to the mountain the same way as last week.

As she was unlocking her bike to take it to the bus, she heard rustling behind her. Her neighbour since forever, Mrs. Carrick, seemed to be up and about. The widow was in her eighties but still took long morning walks every day to keep herself virile. Elisa hadn’t gotten to know her other neighbours, but she helped her tend to her plants and the senior would sometimes feed her cats if she was away for a longer time. She was usually very talkative and sometimes they sat together for coffee and chat, talking about mundane things. She turned and waved to her.

“Good morning, Mrs. Carrick! Back from your morning walk?”

The woman leered at her from behind her thick glasses and went inside, slamming her door as hard as her weak arm could pull. Elisa was stunned for a while but pulled herself back together, getting back to her bike. Maybe she’d had a bad start for the day?

Her trip to the mountain went similarly as last week: she enjoyed the view from the bus, got through the fence inspection and cycled further up. She had most likely taken her medication since she didn’t feel incredibly anxious, as she passed some monsters who were curiously looking at her. As the route was same as to Toriel’s villa in the beginning, she spent more time looking around. Similarly to humans, most monsters didn’t seem to get up early on Sundays. She saw a tall, green lizard-like monster in a black autumn jacket(widening downwards for her large tail) walking together with a smaller version of her and a baby carriage. The mother, she supposed, was softly talking to her perky child and soft hissing could be heard from the carriage. A group of dog-like monsters rushed past both of them, barking not aggressively, but as if talking to each other. One of them was holding a frisbee in their mouth. A red bird was cycling past her, dropping newspapers to people’s doorsteps. A rabbit in an apron was sweeping the passage in front of a large building. A lot of the houses were still built out of timber, but there seemed to be more and more modern houses built, out of proper planks, brick or concrete. The monsters had added their own touch in the building process; many of the houses looked artistic in various shapes and colours. One was completely covered in plants, other one was surrounded by a self-made pond. She thought she saw a big fin under the water. One house- no, it was a humongous tree that seemed to be carved empty, had windows and small terraces higher than she could clearly see. She thought she saw a human child-sized squirrel climbing onto one such terrace. A monster that looked like- Elisa couldn’t stop a giggle- a green jelly pudding seemed to glide and disappear into the ground and at closer inspection she noticed that a small passageway lead to a round wooden door in the ground. There was a red mailbox sitting next to it.

Now that she knew monsters, she felt less afraid to come here. It felt like entering a whole new world, even if she knew the monsters were just living their lives, adjusting the way they could to the surface. She noted in her mind to come to the mountain just to cycle around without any further obligations. Maybe she could find some monster shops or cafés. She realized she’d been smiling through the whole cycling trip, which might explain why so many monsters had confusedly smiled back to her. Humans didn’t do that.

She turned before the road that led to Toriel’s villa, she would visit her and Frisk at some other time. She continued further up, finally reaching a large arch that separated old, mossy brick fences. It was open to a well tended garden that led to a decent sized, red bricked 3-story castle. The garden and the castle contrasted each other, since the garden looked pristine with its short cut grass, symmetrically placed trees and artistically trimmed bushes when the castle was covered in moss similarly to the fence surrounding the site. According to the news the King had bought the castle and a most of the mountain land property for his citizens soon after the monsters emerged. There were protests as some landowners declined, but Asgore and the military most likely made some kind of an offer they couldn’t refuse, since all humans moved away from the mountain in a hurried manner and the quarantine fence was set up. Elisa cycles to the entrance of the castle, locking her bike. She went to the large wooden door, gathering all her courage. She shook the string attached to a large brass bell next to the door, which’ chime announced her arrival. After a short while, the door opened slowly.

She was staring down to a humongous, black eye.

She blinked and took a second look. The ‘eye’ was purple coloured round monster with thin arms and legs and black horns. Most of their body seemed to occupy their large black eye which had a white circle around the white pupil. Under the eye there was a row of protruding upper teeth. The eye blinked with it’s enormous eye lid.

“Yes?” The monster said with a deep, croaky voice.

She pushed her overflowing questions aside which appeared every time she met a new monster and smiled at the monster in front of her.

“Good morning! My name is Elisa Aarre. I am here at the invitation of His Majesty Asgore Dreemurr. May I meet him?

The monster looked at her for a second, wide eyed. They blinked again and bowed slightly. “Yes indeed, let me take you to him.”

As the monster turned, she saw that they seemed to be wearing a suit of sorts. How it stayed on their round body, she had no idea. She had no time to wonder, as she took in her surroundings. The space opened into a large hall to the right. To the left there were doors, probably leading further into the castle. The ceiling was supported with wooden vaults, the walls were of the same red brick as the outer wall and the floors were tiled with large stone slabs, covered with large ornate carpets. The hall was sparse of furnishing except for long wooden tables with benches on the sides of the hall, and a large table at the end of it with tall wooden chairs. The walls looked like there were something like paintings before. In the middle of the further wall there was a massive fireplace where a monster that looked like a big cockroach was kindling the fire. Few other various kinds of monsters were sitting and chatting at the tables, others were scurrying about carrying stacks of papers or other items. The eye-monster led her not into the hall, but past it to the other side to another door. It opened to a pathway that led to a large garden opening enclosed by shallow bushes. Elisa’s eyes widened.

The opening was covered in a rainbow of flowers. She recognized some flowers native to Scotland, but also large amount of foreign species that shouldn’t be able to thrive this far north, especially as it was getting colder already. Still the garden shower no signs of wilting, every plant was in full bloom. The middle of the opening had a white gazebo, surrounded with water. Closer to the gazebo she saw flowers she’d never seen and probably no other human had either. There were blue, shining flowers and she thought she heard whispers coming out of them. Blue, glowing mushrooms, one squeaked. Red flowers that produced small flames. Yellow flowers that shone softly. Green flowers which had vines sprouting out of them on the ground, moving slowly and constantly. Violet flowers that were humming various tunes in harmony, surrounding the area with strange, but soothing music. The monster led her into the gazebo through a small bridge and there were few cushioned chairs and a table with tea equipment. On the other side she saw a large, horned monster turned away from them, watering the flowers. He had a pink pullover on.

“Asgore, your guest is here.” _He was called by his first name?_

The large monster turned and smiled, nervously? He set down the watering can and walked to the gazebo, crossing a small bridge on the other side. As he got closer, Elisa had to gaze higher. He was taller than all the other monster’s he’d met. The gazebo was high enough for him, but he’d surely have to crouch under every door frame made for humans. He’d probably have to turn sideways too, as his torso was very wide. He was a goat monster similar to Toriel, but he had golden hair and beard, hazel brown eyes and his white, curved horns were massive. As large as he was, he looked as if he was trying to make himself look as small as possible. His presence didn’t feel alarming to her in any way. He’d grasped his hands. His shirt said Mr. Dad Guy.

“Thank you, Loox. You may go, we have everything we need.” His low, rumbling voice was clear even though he talked quietly. Loox bowed to them both and turned back to the castle. Asgore smiled meekly to Elisa, who- surprisingly calmly- curtseyed deeply to him. She had no idea was she supposed to or did she even do it right, it just felt right. She tried a very formal approach.

“Your Highness, it’s an honor to meet you. My name is Elisa Aarre and I’m at your service.”

When she straightened up to look at him, she didn’t expect to see the exact similar reaction Toriel had given her. Extremely flustered, that is. She’d probably done something wrong. _Oh man, I’m really not prepared for this whatsoever-_

“Please! Call me Asgore. I am not a king to the humans. Golly, it’s hard enough to be a king to monsters. I’ve tried to get rid of all formality, it just bothers me in the end.” He reached his hand to her, which she shook. His furry hand covered hers completely.

“Let us sit down, I invited you over for a cup of tea, after all.” He was about to sit down when Elisa remembered the bag in her hand.

“Ah! Before that, I have a small gift for you. I didn’t have time to prepare anything else, but here is finnish rye bread and pulla, a sweet pastry roll. They’re frozen, but they thaw quickly. It’s not much, I know, but-”

“Thank you. That is very kind of you, you didn’t need to bring anything. I’ll take them to the kitchen later.”

Asgore’s tone was soft and he seemed pleasantly surprised. He took the bag and took a look into it, hummed and set it aside. They sat down next to each other and he served them both tea in ornamented tea cups similar to the set Toriel had. Additionally there were various different types of cookies and cocktail sandwiches. Elisa took a sandwich on her plate and tasted her tea. It was the same tea Toriel had had, with that same wonderful aroma and flavour. This one didn’t make her suddenly feel her relaxed though, rather it functioned as normal tea would. It was piping hot, as if it was just brought there, which was curious.

As they settled, he let out a long sigh.

“Isn’t it a beautiful day today? Birds are singing, flowers are blooming… On days like these, I like to just sit here and enjoy the tranquility.”

“The garden here is wonderful. Do you take care of it, sir?”

He tsk’ed softly, likely because of the ‘sir’, but answered either way. “Yes, when I’m not carrying out my royal duties, I take care of this garden and the one at Toriel’s school. Sometimes I tell stories to the children about gardening, and about Underground. The youngest ones don’t even remember living there anymore.” He smiled a happy smile.

They sat in silence for a moment, listening to the hymn of the violet flowers.

He clapped his hands together. “So! Tell me about yourself. How did you meet To- the group of monsters you met last Saturday?”

So she did. She briefly explained how she is originally from Finland, came here with her mother to study and stayed for research, how she met Alphys and Undyne when they were there for the first time and how she showed them around. She explained how they’d invited(more like forced, but she didn’t say that) her over for lunch on Saturday and how they’d had a good time. She also added how she’d been spending time with the Alphys, Undyne and the skeleton brothers during the week, with cooking and watching videos.

“And you’ve enjoyed the monsters’ company?”

His face had the same polite smile, but Elisa thought she heard his tone turn slightly sharp. Undyne’s words came into her mind. _Humans haven’t been very… receptive with us, cordial at best._ She looked at him in the eye.

“They are the first proper friends I’ve had in over 10 years. I’ve known them only for a week, yet I know already. I’ve never felt this close to a human except for my mother. They have been nothing but kind to me and I wish to repay that kindness with everything I’ve got. Actually...”

She hesitated for a moment. It was risky, but she wanted to be truthful. She had to drive her point through with him.

“I don’t want to lie to you, your M- Asgore. I have illnesses, and as a side effect of my medication I get migraines, agonizing headaches for days from time to time. After the lunch I felt one coming and had to cancel my future plans, but as I told Sans, he knew what was going on and brought everyone to help me… Toriel cured me, with her magic.”

Asgore’s sharp intake of breath was enough to tell her how serious this was. His smile faded. She continued.

“I don’t know was it temporary or permanent, but I didn’t ask for it, they came to me by their own free will. Toriel wouldn’t accept any form of gratitude. And I will never ask it of her again, unless she wishes to help. I know about the restriction you’ve set concerning magic, I understand the reason wholeheartedly, monsters deserve to be equal with humans. You deserve so much more. Which is why I ask you not to be angry to them. I take all responsibility and punishment.”

Asgores eyebrows raised. She leaned further on her chair. She’d never felt this determined before.

“Even before that event, I told Toriel and everyone that I wish to help with anything they might have problems with, for example with human relations. My resolve is yet stronger after what she did, what they all did for me by being there with me. I feel like I can never repay my debt to them. So maybe I can do something for the whole monsterkind. So let me cut to the chase, your Majesty. Honestly said, I have no clue what can I do for you that someone more capable couldn’t. But you invited me here, so you must have some plan for me.

What may I, a lowly scientist, do for you?”

Silence fell as they stared at each other. Her hand felt warm. She realized she’d grabbed his hand(more like three fingers) during her outburst, and let go immediately. She was ranting again. Hopefully she didn’t screw up. “I apologise, I didn’t notice-”

“It’s quite alright.” His face was unreadable, as he looked to the side.

They sat in silence, again. Finally, Asgore let out a warm laugh which boomed throughout the garden.

“Frisk was right. It’s like your soul sings with integrity.”

 _My soul…?_ Papyrus had said something similar. And what did Frisk know? Before she could ask him anything, he continued.

“I must apologise to you, miss Aarre. Both Toriel and Frisk told me about this wonderful human they’d met that had treated monsters as truly their equal, without questions, weird looks or such. Who clearly spoke the truth. I was very suspicious but curious, wishing to finally meet such a human. These three years have been rough, to all of us.”

“Please, call me Elisa.” In the back of her head she was surprised that he’d pronounced her name right.

Asgore hummed in acceptance and gazed to his flower garden, probably seeing a whole different view in his head. Elisa thought of first few months after the Barrier broke. Her own shock of finding out about the monsters, then overwhelming curiosity, then shock again when she learned how the rest of the humankind had reacted to the ‘intruders’. How her mother was loudly discussing with her church friends about ‘these demons they needed to banish’. How her colleagues had talked about them as mere things to research, how they’d wish to have one on the examination table. All the negative media that turned everything against the monsters. The riots. Things have gotten both better and worse since then. The monsters have slowly gotten more rights but violence has risen as monsters are more free to travel, and there are new casualties almost every day. International relations have worsened as some countries support welcoming the monsters when others would like nothing else than to banish them back from where they came from. Or exterminate them entirely.

She took a better look at Asgore’s face. She didn’t know much about how monsters’ looks changed when they aged( _Do monsters even age?_ ) and he looked young… but at the same time, so, so very old. He looked exhausted, as if he hadn’t slept properly for decades. Maybe this was one of the rare moments he had to relax before returning to work. He turned back to her and broke the thoughtful silence.

“I have no plans for you, Elisa. To me, your friendly presence is enough. I would like to get to know you better.” His tired-looking eyes crinkled and he smiled fondly for a moment, but soon he huffed.

“To help the whole monsterkind, well… At the moment the biggest issue is our freedom. The process to getting my citizens equal rights with humans has been excruciatingly slow. I have been informed that we have the possibility to appeal both to the members of the Scottish Parliament and the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Traveling to other countries will depend on will they acknowledge us as equals, adding our rights into their legislation. Until recently the Scottish Parliament has been relatively cooperative, but after the latest election in May it seems that the amount of members opposing monsters has risen. Even if we somehow managed to get some member's attention, they’d either decline our proposal for whatever reason or the proposal gets sucked in the cogs of the legislation system, denied by some other factor.”

Elisa was surprised. She didn’t follow news too often, but monster legislation sounded like something that should show up more often. Were they not considered important enough news, or was it an avoided subject? All news there were about monsters lately were about monster homicides or the same old fabricated, no-proof news about what horrible thing some monster had done.

Asgore looked like he was about to slump forward and grab his face before he caught himself, straightening up with a sigh. “If this continues our progress might reverse. I’m at loss, monster politics function so differently…”

Elisa felt her heartbeat fasten, as something clicked in her mind. This was big, but it might work. It would have to.

“Members of the Parliament are chosen by the people. What you need to do is to appeal to the human masses, no?”

Asgore looked at her curiously, as her tone raised with slight excitement.

“Do you have something in mind?”

“I have no experience with people or media. But I could pull some strings.”

Asgore listened to her idea, his face first twisting with confusion and worry, then brightening some. They discussed pros and cons, things he’d be willing to accept, what he denied. They came up with a rudimentary plan and both chuckled, as they settled into a more relaxed silence. They enjoyed their tea and continued chatting about mundane, calm things, Elisa talking about her work and Asgore telling stories about his gardening and the monster school. He also assured her that nothing would come of the healing incident. In the early afternoon she had to leave to her mother’s. He led her back to the front yard. Elisa didn't notice the curious looks the other monsters gave her in the hall. Outside they shook hands again, this time with genuine smiles and more assurance.

“It was truly a pleasure to meet you, Elisa. We will meet again soon.”

“ ‘Till next time, Asgore!” She made a small curtsy, which rewarded her with a snort from the large monster. She grinned brightly and bid him farewell.

 

She’d make it work.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so it begins... what though? Stay tuned! (๑￫ܫ￩)


	12. House of Flames

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing our favourite, hottest bartender, squishy human biology, jealous Sans and some soul talk
> 
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

**Elisa:** Knock knock

 _huh._ Sans had dozed off finally in the early morning and woke up around midday on Monday. He’d spent most of the Sunday evening and night fixing their old VHS player as Papyrus had wanted to watch his old MTT videos. It worked again, for now. Since the players weren’t sold anymore, the next option would be to convert the videos to DVDs in some store. While fixing, he had the _joy_ of listening to Papyrus gush about Mettaton’s latest concert he’d seen online and how he was returning to UK in a few weeks. He wished the tin can would notice his request through his fan club, wishing him to perform in Scotland, even if there were no large cities around. Sans hated the obnoxious, narcissistic piece of scrap metal, but he wanted to see his brother happy.

Either way. Waking up to a knock knock joke was great, especially when it came from her.

 **sans:** who’s there?

She answered shortly.

 **Elisa:** Canoe

 **sans:** canoe who

 **Elisa:** _Canoe_ recommend me a good monster owned restaurant or café? I’d like to take someone there during the day time.

His soul felt heavy. _who was she meeting?_ He’d wanted to take her there himself, but he told him about his favourite place anyways.

 **sans:** grillby’s is the _hottest_ place in the city. west of us, east of downtown on oakband road, next to the fancy movie theater. his burgs are sure to _ignite_ your appetite.

 **Elisa:** Thank you, I’ll check it out!

 **sans:** no prob

He sighed, trying to ignore the nagging in his skull about how she had other company she wanted to meet instead of him and got up. He’d have all day before his shift started, so he grabbed his laptop from the trash tornado and plopped back on the bed. Like Elisa had said, he had all the possible knowledge with at his phalanges about humans. He hadn’t been interested about human biology before, but after various, rather fresh happenstances that left him confused or flustered he decided he needed to know more. Since monster biology wasn’t very extensive as monsters were mostly constructed of magic, he had a lot of ground to cover, even if he stuck to basics.

The next few days were just that. Work, hazy sleep and reading about humans. All the human body systems: circulatory, digestive, endocrine, immune, nervous, muscular, reproductive, respiratory, urinary and integumentary systems. Vital organs( _so her ‘heart’ was probably what i felt on saturday_ ). Human bacteria. Sicknesses. In the end, he concluded, that humans were _so squishy_. So fragile. They could die from a simple infected wound. Their own body could attack themselves and kill them in the most painful ways. A lot of things in the world were poisonous or venomous to them. They could create offspring just through sex without specific protection. The thought of any human female and male couple being able to conceive a child without actually actively wanting one was highly disturbing.

But they were also so fascinating. Their body together with other non-magical flora and fauna were such complex biological machines with intricate chemical balancing. Their physical form didn’t use any magic to stay together or function. And they’d studied their own biology till no end, succeeding in medical procedures almost comparing to magical healing. They’d raised their life expectancy from thirties to sixties in a millennium, some individuals living up to over 100 years old. Monster life expectancy depended from monster to monster according to what type they were, did they have offspring and how content they’d been living, but it’s impressive how humans have actually been able to manipulate it.

But they had no idea about souls. How powerful they were, how strong humans’ Intent could be. It was still appalling how monsters and magic were all but forgotten since the end of the War. All that was left were myths and fables. Concerning souls and magic there was the religious and spiritual aspect of humans’ beliefs, but they didn’t really even graze close to the truth. It was sad in a way, how humans weren’t in tune with their souls. Regarding monsters however, it was a good thing. They wouldn’t be trapped again. _now humans could just easily eradicate us without a second thought if they so wished, instead of thinking about a substitutive option._

He knew he was overthinking it all so he closed his laptop. It was Thursday afternoon and he hadn’t been out properly for days. His earlier excuse was the beginning autumn rains, but the weather was clear now. He decided to go out for some grub, where else than Grillby’s. He took a shortcut to the alley near the restaurant.

Grillby had been one of the first monster business owners who’d bought property on the other side of the fence after the total quarantine ended after one year, even if he could only stay open during the day time before he had to return to the Monster District for the night. The beginning was prosperous as curious humans came to ogle at him, but things went downhill fast as the view of monsters deteriorated through the months. Rumours circled that he bewitched humans with his food and drinks, using them later in his malevolent rituals. Obviously there was no proof, but the restaurant had been trashed multiple times. At least it couldn’t be burned, as Grillby had covered everything with flameproof magic. Later on he covered everything also with heavily fortifying magic and now even a Tsunderplane couldn’t break through the windows without magic. Things truly calmed down as Ice Wolf and his relatives had been set as bodyguards to the door. It was wonderful what an effect a simple low growl had on possible trouble makers. Now the customers were almost exclusively monsters. Sans greeted Ice Wolf on his way in and stopped in his tracks.

 _elisa is here_. He could feel her soul’s presence immediately, forming his shield quickly. He forced himself to move further in.

The restaurant looked like a modern version of the one in Underground, only bigger with more tables, a billiard table and with added private booths to the left, which could be covered with see-through curtains. Blues was playing. The regulars greeted him, asking where he’d been. He distractedly exchanged a few words and puns and went to the counter. Grillby greeted him with a warm flicker of the flames in his head, offering him a ketchup bottle. He thanked him, absent-mindedly sucking on the bottle while turning around and focusing on her soul.

She was in the bottom left booth, far away from the counter. She was facing away from him and he could see someone else facing her. They were together looking at a laptop screen. The booth was draped with a curtain so he couldn’t see their face properly, only that their hair was spiky and green.

Then he heard a deep laughter together with _hers_. It was a male voice.

His soul churned. Did she have a boyfriend? No, she’d said she had no friends, so most likely no romantic company either then. But then maybe she’d gotten to know him during this week and they were here on a date? _did she ask him about this place to meet this guy here??_ Sans almost bit the nozzle off the ketchup bottle. He was getting ahead of himself again, he knew. He didn’t know anything about the situation, maybe he was someone from her work and they’re just sharing a late lunch. A great distance away from the university. He definitely wasn’t jealous just because some man was dining with her! He had no right to, either way. There was no realistic chance of Sans and Elisa wounding up together, no matter how he daydreamed about it. He was just some pathetic monster. He’d tried to quench such thoughts and failed hopelessly. So he hadn’t kept contact with her, hoping that would help. It didn’t.

Sans felt Grillby’s questioning tone in his head. He turned to Grillby, as he nodded towards the corner booth while cleaning the counter with a rag. _Your acquaintances?_ Sans felt the question appear in his mind. He’d gotten used to Grillby’s telepathic speech. It was hard for beginners to figure out words, as he talked through emotions. Not many could have a proper conversation with him except for other elementals and Sans.

“nah grillbz, just the female human. they been here together before?”

 _She’s brought 10 different humans here since Tuesday. Most of them left rather abruptly._ It took a while for Sans to figure out what he said. He hummed thoughtfully. Either she’s having a bunch of blind dates in the middle of the day or it was about something else. He felt slightly calmer, if still puzzled. The presence in his head felt delighted.

 _She’s been very polite, welcoming every monster that came to talk to her. Even Muddle, and he succeeded dropping slime all over her shirt and table yesterday. Same couldn’t be said about her companions._ Grillby’s speech created a slight pressure in his skull. He was rarely this talkative, so she must’ve really left a good impression. Sans turned back to look at the booth and smiled softly. It was nice to know she was kind with all other monsters too.

“yeah g, she’s pretty great.” The presence in his head felt amused, but he didn’t sense any words being said. He saw Elisa’s figure on the edge of the booth chair and she was calmly sitting straight, pointing at things on the screen. He couldn’t hear anything over the music and other ruckus in the restaurant. Sans removed the irksome shield around his soul. He wouldn’t eavesdrop, but he could maybe figure out what was going on through her soul. Her emotions streamed towards him openly.

Anxiety. Worry. Excitement? Determination. Concentration. Curiosity. He could sense when she was asking something and when she was listening with moments of revelation, writing things down as the man answered. It continued for a while when suddenly there was a sharp spike of anger which quickly turned into acceptance and understanding. The man was holding his neck while Elisa was nodding, making an ‘it’s fine’ hand gesture. They discussed a while longer when the man packet the laptop away and they stepped out of the booth. Elisa was clothed business casual with a grey vest, white button-up shirt and black pants. The man had a bunch of metal on his face, a band t-shirt, worn-out jeans and combat boots. _is she into guys that look like that?_ He had no idea about what is attractive to humans. They tended to all look the same with very varying clothing and trinkets. They shook hands and the man exited the restaurant, while Elisa returned to the booth. She radiated an odd combination of anxiety and relief as she wrote something more down. She looked a bit slumped forward in the booth, holding her elbows on the table. Sans got off the bar stool and strolled to her with his half-drunk ketchup bottle. The curtains were drawn back, so he could see that her eyes were closed and her hands were under her chin.

“i didn’t know you were the type to nap in restaurant booths. thought i was the only one.”

He was glad he’d remembered to put his shield on right before talking. He would’ve been floored otherwise. As Elisa opened her eyes, she felt surprise and joy. Such explosive joy, caused by seeing _him_. Her anxiety all but died out. She laughed and looked so much more open with her emotions and facial expressions than a week ago, or just a few minutes ago with that man.

“Nono, it’s just been a couple of tiring days. Hello, Sans.”

She got out of the booth and hugged him and he gladly hugged back. It was wonderful, even with the shield. Sans almost sputtered as he heard a few whistles behind him. He focused on his normal poker face as she pulled away. She either didn’t notice the whistles or paid them no mind. “Want to sit with me? I still got two hours before I need to go to work and I haven’t eaten yet.”

“sounds great.” They sat down and he waved to Grillby to call him over. “my treat. whatcha want? anything to drink?”

“You don’t need to…” Sans raised his brow bone and smirked, sensing her exasperation. Grillby arrived to take their order. “... Fine. I’ll just treat you the next time. I could try the burger with the… stormberry sauce this time. And more tea later please, surprise me with what kind.” She smiled to Grillby who nodded, his flames flaring happily.

“my regular to me. thanks, g.” Grillby walked away. His presence felt amused the whole time. _what’s his deal?_

“Thank you for suggesting this place. The food is delicious and Grillby’s been a great host, even if he doesn’t talk. And don’t think I missed the puns in your message!”

 _she noticed!_ “well you gotta admit, he really _lights the place up_.” They chuckled. “what are you up to here, were you meeting with someone?” He tried to sound as nonchalant as possible, though he was dying to know.

“I’ve been interviewing social media managers for a project I’m planning with Mr. Dreemurr. I’m looking for someone who can help me hire people to set up a website, help me add content on it and later on plan events, videos and such things together with me. I can tell you and the others more once I get some progress going on. Alan just left, I hired him since well, the earlier applicants were... less than satisfactory.” Irritation swirled in her soul for a moment.

Sans continued listening, but his soul lurched and his eye lights threatened to go out when he heard 'Dreemurr'. He kept his voice leveled.

“you’ve... met asgore then?”

“Oh, yes! Last Sunday, at his castle. We had a very nice meeting. I told him about how I met you guys, about myself somewhat, he talked about his garden and the monster school and we came up with that little project of ours.” She had a small, smug smile, her soul felt like she was pleased with herself. “I want to keep it a bit under covers for now and reveal it as a surprise. I also told him about the migraine healing incident as I didn’t want to keep it a secret from him, accepting any consequences for breaking his law as I don’t want Toriel to take any of the blame. He forgave it.”

… That was such a foolish and naive thing to do. He could’ve misunderstood, thinking Toriel was forced to use her magic. Elisa had no idea how dangerous Asgore could be. But then again, Asgore could’ve been angered if he found out from a monster, thinking they were covering for her. A human facing him themselves, asking him to forgive _monsters_ and let _her_ face the aftermath must’ve left a good impression. Sans was outraged, hearing she was willing to sacrifice herself over them. He wanted to scream at her for asking for punishment when they were the ones coming to her without her asking. He was internally screaming at himself for not warning her sooner. He wanted to hug and k-kiss her for being so absolutely sweet and honest. She's too good for this world and too good for him, no doubt. He had to settle for taking a deep, hopefully calming breath.

“it’s... _wonderful_ that your meeting went so well. but just in case for future… you should be careful around him.”

“How come?”

He paused, tapping his phalanges on the table. “his history is not mine to tell and i don’t think it’s smart to ask him before you know him better, if even then. asgore made a grave( _heh_ ) decision long ago to protect monsters that ended up badly for some humans. it’s also the reason why toriel isn’t with him anymore. this is known only by monsters for a reason. just... watch your words around him? please?”

She looked at him for a moment, seemingly deciding not to chase the matter further. “Okay, I’ll keep that in mind.”

Their food arrived, Sans’ normal burger and fries, Elisa’s burger had blue jam in between and she examined it curiously. Sans covered his food with ketchup, as always. Elisa said nothing, but she smiled a bit and from her soul she felt both grossed out and amused. She bit into her burger, her soul throbbing with a similar emotion of bliss as at Toriel’s. A small, adorable cry of _‘nnh!’_ left her throat. Grillby’s food didn’t have so much magic infused, expect for special orders. But he used a lot of ingredients only found in the Underground. If he remembered right, stormberries made the food taste electric. As if there were miniature lightning bolts in your mouth, stimulating the taste buds relentlessly. Only rock elementals could gather them safely, as they grew between Waterfall and Hotlands,  in the perpetual aggressive thunderstorm.

“that good, huh?”

She swallowed her bite. “All monster food is so f- so _marvelous_! It’s indescribable. I should take a break from eating here, all other food is starting to taste like cardboard.” She giggled, elated.

Sans chuckled. _did she almost swear? ... cute._ They continued eating in comfortable silence, it looked like Elisa wanted to fully focus on her burger. Grillby brought her some red tea, probably from Kindleleaf plant. Growing close to Hotlands’ lava, usually served during winter, it magically keeps it’s drinker warm for hours. She savoured the drink with her eyes closed. Sans was content reveling in the strong emotions she emitted, through his shield. He weakened it ever so slightly, to feel more. It was like he was consuming sustenance for both his body and soul. He needed to take her to eat monster food more often.

“Sans?”

He turned his attention to her, instead of her soul. Curiosity was stewing under her contentment.

“hm?”

“Wanna do the question for question thing again?”

“uh oh.”

“It’s just… Something’s been bothering me all week. I just don’t know am I paying too much attention to it or not.” She paused and sipped her tea.

“Papyrus and Asgore mentioned my soul. Do you know anything about that?”

Sans’ soul missed a beat. This wasn’t maybe the best place for the introduction of souls, but he went with it. Explaining the basics was nothing special, after all, and there were no other humans around.

“well yes, both humans and monsters all have souls.”

Her soul understandably felt suspicious. “... Do you mean you are spiritual or-”

“no, i mean literally. souls are our concentrated essences. what makes you ‘you’, emotions, memories n’ all that jazz. monsters are fully harmonized with their souls, since it’s the cache of our magic which our bodies are mostly made of, too. humans have a very small amount of magic as you are mostly corporeal, but the amount you do have is in your soul. Monsters can see everyone’s souls, sometimes feel them, helping us determine is someone a friend or foe but humans don’t have that ability. it’s located in the chest, right here.” He put his hand on his sternum.

“Can you see mine?”

“yes.”

“What does it look like?”

He looked at her soul in her chest, now with her ‘permission’. A natural smile replaced his grin as he gazed at it’s gentle glow.

“it’s deep blue. bright. shines gently. feels kind, honest.” He didn’t want to tell her about the shield, or the color changes.

“Why is it blue?”

“there are seven main magical colours, which human souls possess. it probably meant that the human mages back in the day could control only one aspect of magic. yours is the traditional color of integrity. monster souls are white.”

He could feel how she was almost bursting with both curiosity and doubt. “you don’t believe me, huh?”

Immediately she felt troubled, sighing. “It’s hard to believe such a thing when I can’t experience it myself. Is there a way for me to see it?”

“well, a soul it pulled out in few occasions. when there is a magic fight, in medical situation when the soul needs healing or in intimate moments between lovers or close family members. there’s been a few situations where a human’s soul has been pulled out in a conflict, but they’ve only felt it being pulled out not seeing it. i don’t think you could, either. there might be a way to build a scanner of sorts, to turn the magic data into light wavelenghts. i could discuss it with alphys, she’s researched souls more than me.”

“Could you pull it out of me, then? I could maybe at least feel it.”

Even if he was expecting the question, his cheek bones still flushed blue. “i c-can, but that’s considered indecent to do in public if it’s not for a fight. a bit similar as nudity to humans. not to mention it would make you extremely vulnerable.”

“Why?”

“monsters can absorb human souls to become extremely powerful. we don’t _want_ to, fighting nor killing isn’t in our nature, but it’s possible. it’s the reason we were feared and got trapped by humans in the first place.”

“Alright, fair enough. But I trust that you wouldn’t hurt me.”

His soul warmed up from the pure trust and honesty her soul sent to his. There was a moment of silence as Elisa finished her tea.

“welp. so much for q for q, huh.”

“Oh that’s right Sans, I’m sorry-”

“it’s fine, don’t fret it. i’ll ask you more the next time i hit my questioning phase.” He chuckled, but she frowned and still felt troubled.

“Still, I feel bad…  I just can’t stop myself if I get too excited, which is why I tend not to talk. I don’t want to be a bother.”

“you’re not, don’t say that. just don’t spread this information to the humans, think it’s pretty obvious why.”

“Yeah. Thank you for trusting me.” She smiled, feeling a bit more at ease and Sans decided to change the topic.

“anyways... pap told me he heard from undyne how she and alphys would like to organize a housewarming party. the normal schtick, food and anime night. you wanna surprise them and combine papyrus’ cooking lesson with that next saturday? it would be just us five, maybe tori and frisk can visit for a few hours.”

She visibly brightened up. “That’s a great idea! I haven’t had any time to see any of you this week, and now I could cook something for Toriel instead. Now that I’m done with the hiring, I can use tomorrow for planning that. I can contact them to seal the deal.”

“great, ‘cause i’m fine doing no planning. i’d rather just show up.”

It was getting late for Elisa, so they got out of the restaurant once Sans paid(He'd just paid his whole tab last week and didn't want to look bad starting a new one right now). She shouted thanks and bye to Grillby, whose flames roared for a second in return. Some of the regulars shouted bye back to her too, much to her delight so in in the end she wound up saying bye to half of the restaurant. Ice Wolf got his own goodbye at the door and he gave a soft, happy bark unfitting to his figure. Finally, she hugged Sans again, before getting on her bike. Sans watched her go and went to the back alley for his short cut. In his room he thought about trying to nap before his shift, but sleep wouldn’t come to him as he pressed his face on his pillow.

 

He would be lying if he denied being absolutely thrilled with the thought of seeing Elisa’s soul out of her body. _how strong would it feel then?_ He couldn’t even dare thinking about touching it.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up!
> 
> Will Undyne admit that she can't cook?  
> Will Elisa find anime that she likes?
> 
> Stay tuned! ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ


	13. Get to Know Yourself

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing some good times, some bad times and her first, conflicting experience with a soul
> 
> Chapter tags: Panic attack, Aftercare, mental pain
> 
> NOTE: I have nothing against religion. I don't use any denominations as it's not important to the plot and I wish to avoid stereotyping. Don't take it personally if religion is in a bad light in the fan fiction.  
>    
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

Elisa woke up screaming, scaring her cats off her bed. She panted, trying to calm herself down. As per usual, she couldn’t remember her dream, or nightmare, or whatever it was that startled her. It was Saturday, 6am. Groaning, she got up. Sleep wouldn’t come anymore after she woke up that way, no matter what time it was.

Her normal morning routine made her feel like she was in control again. Short meditation session, stretching, shower, clothes, cats, breakfast. For clothing she just took basic jeans, white t-shirt and black hoodie. She checked that everything was ready for the housewarming party which they’d decided to turn into a sleepover: overnight supplies, medication, ingredients for the lunch and the cheesecake she’d made last night. She spent the rest of the morning playing and cuddling with her cats, since she wouldn’t see them until the next morning. At noon she got a text message.

 **sans:** gonna be there in few mins, drag yaself out

 **Elisa:** Okay!

So she got out with a large black duffel bag, holding everything except for the cheesecake. While waiting, she decided to check her mailbox, as it’s red visor was up. It was near the end of September so it shouldn’t be bills and she didn’t order any magazines.

She really should’ve left checking the mailbox till she got back home.

It was full of church brochures and letters. She started browsing and opening them.

**REPENTANCE; DEATH TO SIN, LIFE TO OBEDIENCE**

**How To Restore Your Faith To God**

**JESUS CAN WASH YOUR SINS AWAY**

**Out of Darkness**

**Sin Will Enslave You**

Multiple more similar brochures, plenty more which proclaim how monsters are spawns of Satan here to conquer the living realm. They included instructions on how to avoid being affected by these demons and promises of an upcoming Holy War. There were tens of personal letters, some polite, some extremely twisted in their words, wishing for her to burn in hellfire if she won’t find the way of Christ. Even the pastor of a church she knew had written to her, to plead her stop interacting with the malignant hellions and suggested meeting with him.

Elisa was starting to understand why Mrs. Carrick had acted the way she had on Sunday. She did talk a lot about the activity in her church, which happened to be very anti-monster even if they didn’t discuss it. She had most likely seen her new friends and gossipped about it with her church group. Elisa had nothing against religion, she'd gotten a Christian upbringing. She was however agnostic, trusting more into science. Otherwise she let people believe what they wanted as long as it caused others no harm or trouble. Most religious denominations in Scotland had a neutral stand on monsters, some accepting them as equals but the rest were very much against them. It wasn’t surprising that most attacks on monsters were carried out by people belonging to the more negative denominations. Now she was becoming a target. She didn’t want her new friends to get any trouble because of her, because bigots wanted to keep humans and monsters separated. But there was nothing she could do! She wouldn’t give up her friends because of bullying and the fanatics wouldn’t listen to her reasonings.

“elisa, are you alright? what are those?”

She’d been so deep in her thoughts and full of anxiety that she hadn’t noticed the red convertible turn and stop next to her and Sans and Papyrus getting out. They both looked worried, did she look so distressed? She realized she was grasping the papers so tight she had to force herself to loosen up. She stuffed them back into the mailbox, forced herself to be calm and turned, smiling.

“Hello Sans, Papyrus! I’m good! Those papers were nothing important, just spam. How about you guys, everything ready? Papyrus, are you ready for your second cooking lesson?” _I’ll deal with Mrs. Carrick and her group later. Today should be joyful._

Papyrus’ worried frown quickly changed to an expression of thrill as he asked what were they cooking. Elisa teased him by giving tiny hints, making him whine as they got in the car and started driving east. Papyrus drove and Sans was on the front seat. Sans said nothing during the whole drive, glancing at her from time to time, even though she did her best to smile and keep up the small talk. Even puns just made his standard grin pull upwards only for a moment, when Papyrus gave his normal groan. _Stop looking at me that way!_ She tried to push away the unpleasant thoughts and words she’d read about her and monsters. They weren’t true in any way she knew of course, but it was still upsetting. She could only hope nothing else would come from this. Again, she had to concentrate on not grasping her bag so tight, her fingers were turning numb.

She relaxed a bit as they finally got to their destination. Undyne and Alphys came out to see them and she hugged them both, receiving a bear hug and gentler hug respectively.

“So will you finally tell us why we haven’t been dining together for a week?!” Undyne huffed.

“Yeah, the d-days in the office have been lonely, it’s nice that your labs are finally done.” Alphys’ cheeks were slightly dusted with red.

“It’s a secreet~ ow!” Elisa giggled as Undyne punched her arm, slightly too hard. She bruised easily, so that would leave a mark for sure. “I’ll tell you about my project after next week! Let’s get inside, shall we?”

Sans went to sit to the sofa with Alphys(”so, alph, i actually wanted to talk to you about something…”) as Undyne and Papyrus followed Elisa into the kitchen. She was finally able to forget the insides of her mailbox as she unloaded her duffel bag. She’d decided on Japanese hot pot, _donabe_ , since Alphys and Undyne loved the culture and so that Papyrus learns about new ingredients, how to cook rice and a soup stock and they could all cook together this way. She’d somehow managed to find and buy a real, ceramic _donabe_ pot and a portable gas burner during Friday. With her she’d brought various different kinds of fish, vegetables, mushrooms and eggs together with the base soup ingredients. The cheesecake went into the fridge.

Papyrus was a fast learner during their first cooking session already and had read his spaghetti book thrice during the week, cooking something new from it every day.

Undyne was basically his complete opposite. She was very passionate about everything, one couldn’t deny that. But also very, very stubborn.

“Why do we have to cut everything so small and tidy? Why do you have to measure the liquids so exactly?! NGAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!”

It didn’t sound so impossible anymore when Papyrus had said her house had burned down more than once. Undyne was fast to try smashing the ingredients with her fist, pulverizing the cutting board. The first pot used for the base soup was utterly destroyed as Undyne for some reason tried to ‘stir’ it by stabbing it with a blue, shining- _Did she just conjure a_ **_spear_ ** _out of nowhere??_

Elisa tried to adopt a strict, motherly tone without being terrified of her magic while telling her firmly not to summon any more weapons in the kitchen.

Or not to punch anything or anyone.

Or to not turn the heat up to max to ‘symbolize our passion’.

Undyne growled at her but it looked like she really tried not to cause so much havoc after that. Subsequently only a few utensils were broken and a couple of mushrooms ended up on the ceiling. One skeleton was heavily noogied, there was not enough space for a suplex. Elisa noted there were old marks of destruction in the kitchen. There was a good reason why either Alphys cooked or they ate takedout.

They’d finally scrapped together a _donabe_ pot full of hot soup and cooked ingredients, plates of extra ingredients and cooked rice which they took to the dining table.

“YOU DO! Oh, this is totally my new favourite OTP!!”

They turned to the origin of the shriek-giggle. Sans was flushed blue, hiding his face and groaning while Alphys was blushing red and wiggling in her seat, glancing up to Elisa. She quickly turned back to Sans whispering to him hastily while he tried to shoo her away with his hand. _What were they talking about?_

“i’ll fetch tori and the kid.”

With that he stomped out as they were setting up the table, chased by Alphys’ laughter. Undyne tried to ask her what was that about, but she just giggled and said “l-later” with a smirk. She joined to help with the setting up, gushing about the Japanese dish and how she’d seen it in some anime. Not a long time later the doorbell rang and Sans arrived with Toriel and Frisk. _That didn’t take even 10 minutes, were they in the city already?_ After hugs and greetings, everyone was called to the table. Alphys forced Sans to sit next to Elisa for some reason, wiggling her eyebrows at him. She explained how the food worked. Everyone scooped out the things they wanted to eat and they’d fill the pot with new ingredients. Undyne and Alphys knew already how to use chopsticks and they tried to teach Papyrus, Toriel and Frisk how to use them too. Sans didn’t even try, he fetched himself a fork, picking up the food faster than anyone else.

“BROTHER, DON’T JUST PICK UP ALL THE FISH! REMEMBER TO TAKE SOME VEGETABLES TOO!”

“sorry _broth_ -er you got me, i’m _gill_ ty.”

“SANS!”

“must say though, you guys really aced this. tastes _fin_ tastic.”

Frisk giggles. “It’s _soup_ -erb!”

“NOT YOU TOO!!”

Laughing and groaning is mixed in the table. Elisa wants to comment on the food too, it turned out rather well even though she’d never done it before, she just followed a recipe.

“Papyrus, you’ve improved a lot! The soup and rice came out really good. I only needed to instruct you a bit.”

Papyrus blushed. “NYEHEHEH, THANK YOU! WITHOUT YOUR HELP WE WOULDN’T BE HERE, THOUGH.”

“c’mon paps, don’t be so _koi_.” Papyrus’ blush disappeared and he shrieked frustratedly. Elisa continued.

“And Undyne did well too, uh, once she stopped abusing the ingredients.” Undyne let out a small ‘fuhuhu’ while grinning and scratching her neck. “Which reminds me, I wish to give this _donabe_ pot and the cooker to you two as a housewarming gift! I have no use for it as it’s so big and then we can do this together later too.”

Everyone except for Sans and Elisa let out a long “aww” or “AWW!”.

“T-thank you, Elisa! It’s a wonderful gift.”

“We’ll be sure to invite you over to cook to us anytime, nerd!”

Elisa couldn’t resist and grinned. “It’s o _fish_ al, then!”

Cue more laughter and groaning. The lunch continued in similar manner and Elisa served her cheesecake as dessert. Toriel congratulated her cooking, even though Elisa still believed Toriel’s food to be the best because of her magic. The afternoon continued by them clearing the table and playing board games, with Alphys explaining the rules. Once Papyrus understood how the game went, he won most of the games. (“THE GREAT PAPYRUS VANQUISHES YET AGAIN!!”). As the afternoon turned to evening, they decided to begin the awaited anime marathon, first starting with some children friendly Studio Ghibli movies. Toriel wasn’t so interested, so she and Elisa went to chat in the kitchen with some tea. Her face darkened when she told about her visit to Asgore, but brightened again as she explained about their project to her. She agreed to cooperate once it would be at that stage and promised that they could use the Monster School. They chattered while sometimes glancing at the movie, until Toriel decided it was time for her and Frisk to go home. Frisk complained that she wanted to stay longer but didn’t object under Toriel’s strict stare. Sans took them away again. Undyne got up and went to a closet.

“Finally! Frisk is a great pipsqueak and all, but…” She pulled out some bottles. “IT’S TIME TO GET BOOZED!”

“I AM NOT SURE DO I CONDONE SUCH FIDDLE-FADDLE.”

“C’mon Papyrus, I’ll make you a really nice, tasty drink. It’s called a Long Island Iced Tea, barely strong at all.”

“WELL IF IT IS TEA THEN IT MUST BE ACCEPTABLE!”

Undyne cracked a sharp toothed smile and got to work with the drink. Elisa denied any drinks, instead settling down on the sofa while the others gathered to the kitchen to make their drinks and picked up snacks before starting an anime series. The one Alphys started had violence for Undyne, romance for Alphys and wasn’t too bloody for Papyrus. Elisa was happy with anything and Sans didn’t really care. It wasn’t horribly long series, altogether about 4 hours.

Elisa didn’t pay too much attention, but the anime was about some kind of an afterlife situationwith high schoolers. She preferred looking at the reactions her friends had. How Undyne marveled at the fighting scenes(“FUCK YEAH BADASS HAND BLADES”), how Alphys babbled excitedly when there was… supposedly an deeply emotional moment? And how Papyrus admired the pretty characters. At some point Sans had appeared on the arm chair opposite of her at some point, already fallen asleep at the second episode. Through the anime the main character befriended the other characters, falling in love with one. In the end however, the main character is left alone in tears and despair.

Undyne, Alphys and Papyrus were tipsy at this point and Alphys and Papyrus were openly bawling. Undyne was pretending to have caught some trash in her eye. Once the last episode played, the three discussed the episodes in enthusiasm, chipping in their opinions on each other’s favourite scenes. Elisa was asked something too, she answered with some random scene that she remembered. Undyne went to fetch more drinks while Alphys started going through their DVD pile, debating with Papyrus which series to start next. The night had barely started, after all. Sans was still in deep sleep and Elisa felt comfortable with the hubbub around her.

_Look at you, aren’t you precious. Spending time with your extra special friends._

_Huh…?_ She felt uncomfortable. A familiar buzzing sound, still silent, was whispering in her ears.

_Wonder how much it will hurt now if all this was stripped away, huh?_

Oh no. No no no. This was the worst timing for this.

_It’s not far now. One day, you will slip, you will destroy everything. They’ll think you’re a freak, and you’ll experience how easy your “friendship” is to break._

The nagging sounded like her own voice, but so full of venom. She knew what had woken it up. The anime. Elisa didn’t cry, nor did she feel sad for the main character.

But her own, shortly forgotten but enduring crushing feeling of loneliness rushed back to her when she watched him lose everyone he knew.

It was foolish. She’d seen similar movies before, it was a popular concept in drama. This time however… She was watching with friends she simply couldn’t afford to lose. The buzz in her ears almost covered the noises of the others now. It was much stronger than last time.

_Remember Amanda? She’d really tried to be your friend in your junior class, that dimwit. Remember the disbelieving, spiteful look on her face when she was cradling her arm cast?_

She remembered them laughing and dancing one night, they were meeting her friends…? The next morning she asked what had happened to her.

_“You did this to me, you sick fuck! Don’t talk to me ever again.”_

She couldn’t go out for a run to exhaust herself all of sudden. She had antipsychotic medication with her, but it would make her drowsy and bodily sick and she didn’t want her friends to notice. She didn’t want to worry them. The drug didn’t even work on time, most of the time.

_Remember your one and only romantic endeavor? Like you could forget. The poor fellow basically screamed for you to stay the fuck away when you called the hospital. “Keep that monster bitch away from me!”_

She stared the wall, grabbing her knees. Her vision was starting to blur. Panic was starting to twist around her, it felt like she was being choked. The nagging voice in her ears cackled.

_Like you could be befriended. Like you could really be loved. Sooner or later, you will let everyone down._

It’s not true! She wouldn’t fail anyone this time! She couldn’t handle that.

_It’s not too late. You can still withdraw without hurting anyone… except yourself. It’s already too late for you, you moron. You did this to yourself. But leaving by yourself will hurt much less than them leaving you._

Sans had promised her he’s always be there for her. The others had also said they were her friends now. They helped her. She wanted to be there for them.

**_You know how empty such promises are._ **

She bit into the muscle under her thumb, trying to maintain her grip of reality. She looked around her, blurrily. The trio seemed to still be in the kitchen, they hadn’t seen her. She tried to take slow, deep, shaky breaths. She couldn’t afford losing it now, not here.

**_You disgusting, worthless simpleton. Why do you want to destroy yourself? Have you learned n o t h i n g ?_ **

Why didn’t the nagging just leave her alone? _What should I do?!_

Suddenly, a hand took the wrist of the hand she’d bitten into hard enough to break the skin.

“come with me.”

Stunned, Elisa lets herself be pulled off the sofa with a firm, but gentle grip. She is led through the living room deeper into the house, into a sparsely decorated room, mostly filled with boxes. Spare bedroom, probably. She is put to sit on the bed and a dim table light is turned on. Her back and shoulders were covered with something warm, a blanket maybe. Her sight and hearing were still mostly cloudy but she hears a calm, if slightly strained voice.

“you’re borderline panicking. how can i help you calm down?”

She hazily prodded her memory. Sometimes her mother or her therapist could bring her back from the edge.

“H-help me breathe and c-count down from ten. Tell me where I a-am and that I’m s-safe.” Her voice sounded so weird, like she could barely get the words out. Her face felt wet.

Oddly soft bony hands gently pulled to a curve of a neck and chest and cradled her head and shoulders. “o-okay. listen to my breathing and do the same. breathe in…”

Her ear was next to bare bones but she still heard a deep breath and tried to copy it. Hers was shaky, ragged and still rather shallow. She realized she was shivering.

“repeat after me. ten... “ deep, calm breath out.

“Teeenh…” She closed her eyes and focused on the breathing training. Deep belly breaths.

“you’re doing great. in…” The second breath was slightly easier.

“nine.” They talked at the same time while breathing out. “Nineh...”

“you’re at alphys’ and undyne’s house. it’s saturday night. in…”

Out. They counted eight. “you made delicious food and watched anime. toriel and frisk visited. everyone is happy.” His deep voice vibrated softly in his chest and neck vertebrae.

In. Out. Seven. She relaxed slightly and the hands around her rubbed her head and shoulders tenderly. “you’re surrounded by friends. everything is fine.”

In. Out. Six. The hand massaging her scalp felt good. “it’s okay if you feel bad. we’re here, and we’re not going anywhere.”

In. Out. Five. “you’re not alone. you won’t be alone ever again.” She heard no heartbeat, but she thought she heard, or maybe felt? Some sort of deep pulsating, it’s source located in his chest.

The rest of the numbers weren’t hard or painful to breathe anymore and we also filled with sweet assurances. At some point she’d wrapped her arms around the skeleton, nuzzling into the fuzzy lining of his hood. It smelled like musk, ketchup and old chalk. They stayed like that in silence for who knows how long, Elisa didn’t care for once. She felt at peace and continued listening to his breathing, breathing in the scent of the hoodie.

“feel better?” She nodded into the hood.

“we’re in no hurry anywhere, so you can stay like this as long as you feel comfortable with it.”

“Thank you.” She whispered and tried to hug tighter, but sharp pain shot through her hand and she winced. She reluctantly pulled away to see that her hand was bloody. Sans’ eyelights turned to pinpricks as he saw the damage, grabbing the hand gently.

“shit. wait here, i’ll be right back with some towels.”

He let her go slowly and got out of the room. Elisa resisted the small panicked feeling that didn’t want her to be alone right now. She trusted him and the logical part of her brain was functioning again. She was safe and the buzzing, nagging voice was gone. For now.

Reality rushed to her. She’d freaked out and almost snapped. She didn’t know what might’ve happened. She was so weak, telling herself over and over again that she wouldn’t screw anything up even though some silly animation started a chain reaction that almost ruined everything. Sans had really saved her hide. There would be questions. He deserved answers, she knew that much.

Sans returned shortly with both damp and dry paper towels, sat back down and started to clean the hand carefully. There was a clear bite wound in the muscle under her thumb, but it had stopped bleeding for the most part. She took some of the towels and started squeezing the hand herself as Sans threw the bloody ones into a trash can. She looked at him.

“I’m sorry for all of this.”

“don’t be. do you want to talk about it?”

Honestly, she didn’t. She opened her mouth, but closed it soon after, looking away.

“you don’t need to. i’m just worried and curious and, heh, i guess i do still have those questions stored from earlier-”

“I’m _happy._ ” She blurted out. It must’ve sounded out of context, judging from his quizzical look.

“... And it scares me. So much. I wait for the other shoe to drop, where I ruin everything and lose everyone.”

“that’s not gonna happen.”

“It’s happened before. Multiple times.” Sans was staring at her with an expression she couldn’t read. She sighed. “This is why I run. Drugs work too slow, but exhaustion helps keep the daunting voices at bay.”

Silence fell between them as she kept on gripping her damaged hand. She felt sorrowful as she really wasn’t ready to explain further. The explanation wasn’t enough, she knew. She’d have to figure out later how to prepare for such situations better, because boy was that too close. Sans had seen too much already. She tried to gather herself, straightening her back and taking a fast, deep breath.

“Well, no use just moping here. We can go back and-”

He put a hand on her shoulder. “can i try to show you something?”

She stilled. “What?”

He hesitated. “i don’t know will this work, but… do you trust me?”

“Of course. Always.” The words left her mouth before he even finished. He frowned, but smiled a bit and and his cheekbones were lightly dusted with cyan.

“i’ll show you your soul. turn towards me.”

She was startled. “R-really? I thought it was a some kind of a big deal.” She didn’t resist however and turned to him curiously.

“looking is fine, we’re in private… this might feel a bit weird since it’s your first time. breathe deep and stay calm.”

He raised his spread hand close to her sternum, looking at her eyes for permission. She nodded and he looked back to her chest, now with a concentrated look. She felt a tug inside her chest. Not a painful one, but it felt like some important organ inside her had suddenly started to move. His hand turned around, looking like a ‘come hither’ motion, slowly pulling back. Her instincts told her something was horribly wrong and she should flee, but she fought the feeling. She saw, or felt, something come out of her chest and it levitated close to her as Sans put his hand down. It looked, or felt, it was so confusing what she was supposed to sense, like something that wasn’t supposed to be there. She tried squinting, but she couldn’t see the shape any better. She was guessing it looked like a very hazy ball and she could see through it. She raised her hand towards it, as suddenly something shot out of it and she felt searing pain.

“Ah!” She pulled her hand away, but the pain was immediately gone. There was no damage.

“oh right, it’s… let me try, maybe…”

Sans lifted his hand now, slowly moving it towards the hazy form. Suddenly the ball turned into something else, something smaller. She still couldn’t see it clearly, but it looked like… a heart symbol? And it seemed to be faintly blue, like Sans had said on Thursday. Maybe Sans saw it better. She looked at him and froze.

Sans’ eyelights were larger than she remembered them ever being, as he was staring at the heart shape. He was fully blushing now, his smile was gentle and he looked so affectionate and... sad? His hand joints were glowing faintly, probably all of him was, under the clothes. His hand was twitching near to the form, as if he was trying to either touch it or pull away, not being able to decide. He glanced at her and flinched, cleared his throat, retracting his hand quickly.

“can you see it?”

She nodded. “I see something.”

“you can try touching it again, the shield is gone for now. it’s your own soul, it’s okay, it won’t hurt you.”

Trusting Sans, she slowly raised a finger to touch the faint shape again. Her finger reached it, moving slightly. It felt like warm, smooth stone.

She felt the touch in her mind.

It didn’t feel intruding, simply odd. She felt the emotions she was feeling get mirrored, as if she was feeling them stronger from two different sources at the same time. She also saw flashes of something. Memories, she realized. She grabbed the whole, almost transparent heart in her hand gently.

It felt like her whole being was surrounded with slight pressure. As if she was in very calm, lukewarm water. Now she felt her emotions with more accuracy and could intuitively pinpoint and name each one. Surprise, disbelief, excitement, giddiness, curiosity, anxiety, multiple others. Memories going more and more to her past flowed into her awareness, surfacing and submerging in a swift but calm manner. She subconsciously prodded further.

The last two weeks were filled mostly with happiness. She’d felt a vast variety of happy emotions and noticed how kindness and honesty were strongest when she was interacting with monsters. She already loved them so dearly. She thought she should be alarmed by the feeling but it was just so clear, so definite. But there were small, blank memories too. Something she should remember, but there was nothing but emptiness, and anxiety afterwards. She scoured further to her past. More neutral and sadder memories came by that she remembered. Mostly feeling numbness or anxiety while interacting with humans. Love and exasperation with her mother. Unexplainable unease with her stepfather. More blank holes. She focused on one of the larger holes and felt that… there was supposed to be something. She felt shadows of emotions. Anger. Fury. Fear. Despair… Desire? Deep, deep feeling of **_need_** that she had never felt before. Or had she? In those troubling dreams...

She knew what those blank holes were and she was constantly frustrated because they were the reason her life had gone down the gutter. The reason she was scared all the time that she would lose control. Now was maybe her chance to get to the bottom of them, she realized, to figure out what was going on. She squeezed her soul tighter and searched deeper for bigger holes, ignoring the dull pain the squeezing caused all around and inside her. She felt like someone was shouting and shaking her, but she ignored that too. She was so close. There! Back in her childhood. Two gigantic, ominous dark pits, suffocating all other thoughts as she got closer. All of her senses screamed at her not to go close to them, pleaded with her, but she stubbornly went to touch the closer one. Just a careful peek at first.

The outburst of pure rage was so strong, so agonizing that she felt like she was being burned alive. Her core, her essence was blistering. It hurt too much. Was she screaming? She couldn’t let go, even though she tried. The memory still didn’t show itself, she didn’t want to see it anymore, _please please let me go it hurts oh god it hurts-_

Suddenly she snapped back into to bedroom, gasping for breath. She would’ve fallen on the floor, if it wasn’t for something holding her. Not her body, but her soul. The hazy heart was now surrounded by a clear cloud of blue and it was pulled away from her shaking hands. Sans’ hand and left eye were glowing with the same blue. He looked highly distressed, sweat droplets on his skull and with a deep frown. He motioned with his hand and the soul floated back into her chest. It felt like something clicked softly inside her and she immediately felt more relaxed, even in her distraught state. They both panted in the silence for a while.

“that... that wasn’t what i wanted to show you. you went too deep, i think.”

Elisa wasn’t sure what to say. Her whole world view was turned upside down once again since the Barrier broke. She had a soul! That she could touch! Everyone had one!! And at first it had been so thrilling, experiencing her whole being, her emotions and memories from such a new angle. Too bad most of her memories weren’t pleasant. She wasn’t closer to figuring out what those missing holes entailed, but she knew now that they were something horrible. She swallowed.

“I… I wanted to…”

_I want to know why am I so messed up._

_I want to fix this._

_I don’t ever want to hurt any of you._

A sob raised from her throat.

“I just want to remember.”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> elisa has a sad
> 
> Next up! What does Sans think 'bout all'a dis?!
> 
> Also: **This is my 500 views, 50,000 words and 1 month milestone chapter!!** I hope you've liked the fan fiction so far. We're only starting!


	14. Karhunpalvelus

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Introducing: Alphys sticking her snout where it doesn’t belong, nightmares and Sans fucking stuff up cause bOI that gurl cray cray
> 
> Chapter tags: Nightmare/flashback, 2nd hand mental pain
> 
> Karhunpalvelus = Literal translation; bear’s service. Used for any ill-considered action with an unfortunate result. Based on old Fable where well-meaning but clumsy and foolish bear tries to help a gardener, killing him in the process. This chapter is not so dark, but the idiom fit!
> 
> My deepest apologies for the 3 month hiatus! I’ve been busy with other art/fic work. I’ll try to update more often from now on, though I give no promises. I’m horrible with schedules and deadlines.
> 
> I hyped this chapter cause I thought I'd finally get to write something smexy but the story wrote itself in a way that the chapter would've been too long for it. Next chapter it is! I hope this chapter doesn't repeat too much.
> 
> If you like my work and would like to help me out, I’m looking for a beta who’ll tell me when something is written weird ^^ Holla me up if interested.
> 
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)

As tears rolled off her face, now out of sadness instead of panic, Sans hugged her gently without knowing what was going on nor what to do. This wasn’t how he’d expected things to go. The plan was to have a nice, relaxing evening with friends, but that plan had had a rough start right from the beginning.

 

~~~

 

When they had rolled next to her in the morning, she was staring at some crunched up papers at her mailbox. Not to mention Sans sensed her anxiety from a house away, before they got out of the car. It was roaring together with worry. Her shield was fully up and she acted like everything was alright, too much so, as she was more talkative than usual. Small talk wasn’t really her thing, at all. She was forcing herself to talk about anything, the weather, the upcoming sleepover, the cooking, how she’d prepared, to distract them. It seemed to work on Papyrus, though. Sans had to focus on shielding himself properly throughout the whole drive before he’d summon some of his bullets to feel more safe under the restlessness surging out of her soul. She calmed down during the drive but the anxiety never really left her, staying on a back burner. He was worried, but hoped that the upcoming cooking catastr- _lesson_ with Undyne and Papyrus would distract her from whatever it was. He’d ask her later. Instead he had something to discuss with Alphys and he walked to her once they'd arrived.

”so, alph, i actually wanted to talk to you about something.”

She curiously followed him to the sofa as the others discussed the insides of Elisa’s bag.

“W-what is it Sans?”

He always had to remind himself that Alphys didn’t remember him anymore in the same way as before. Now they were only acquaintances through Undyne and Toriel. How she’d helped him and Papyrus when they needed it the most. _focus, sans, you can befriend her again, properly this time._

“i’ve been thinking. humans can see our normal magic attacks but they can’t see souls, at least according to what i know. didn’t you do some research on converting magical wavelenghts into electromagnetic radiation?”

“Y-yes, I had a crack at it a long t-time ago in my old lab before I got b-b-busy... with… W-well. Either way, I-I think I almost had it! I just had a few p-problems, especially with thaumaturgic resistance and the soul resonance…”

She delved into the subject as she remembered more and more about it and Sans listened with both interest and delight, pointing out his own suggestions. It felt like old times when they had been working together, but now with no pressure about getting the work done fast and efficient. Not that Alphys remembered it. They discussed how Alphys was planning to build a lab into their large garage so that she can work on her personal projects while researching and teaching at the University, and how Sans was willing to help, especially with the soul scanner. At the same time they listened to the sounds of chaos emanating from the kitchen and Sans had to chuckle at how Elisa scolded Undyne about her spears and other actions in the kitchen. He sensed her surprise and alarm but those feelings were soon drowned by amused irritation. She could handle her and Papyrus was there too. Alphys sounded excited about the project, her eyes were practically glimmering and her stuttering was mostly gone. She seemed to know somehow that he knew more than enough about the subject, even though she didn't know _how_.

She had a thoughtful look on her face, as if she was about to ask something. But then her eyes turned glassy for a moment and her attention clearly turned to some other thought. It was a look Sans knew very well. He’d gotten used to it.

“This sounds so exciting! And totally doable, especially if you help! Though, Sans… how come you suddenly need a soul scanner?”

Sans' signature grin was unreadable.

“Elisa asked about it some time ago, and i suppose it’s, heh, my _soul_ duty to help, right?”

… Or so he’d at least thought. Then he realised that he hadn't kept his magic in check and felt some warmth on his cheekbones, which she noticed while ignoring his pun. He recognised a mischievous smirk when he saw one. It was what Alphys called her ‘moe face’, whatever that meant. It usually didn't mean anything good to the person who caused it. She hummed smugly, a bit longer than appropriate.

“Uhummm… I've happened to notice that you seem to s-spend quite some time with her, according to what I’ve witnessed and w-what she has told us.”

She started counting her claws, her pitch raising.

“Going to her place, inviting her over, t-taking care of her- I mean ohmygods you teleported the Queen to her- and y-you were the one to suggest this little get-together.”

He’d told Elisa that they’d planned the event, which was not a lie. She didn’t need to know it was his idea to begin with and that he gave the idea subtly to Undyne during the week. But Alphys didn’t miss that and kept on stacking her ‘evidence’ up. Her voice lowered to an excited whisper.

“My senses are t-telling me that there’s s-something more going on. You like her, don’t you?!”

He sputtered at the sudden question that he should’ve seen coming, his face flushing cyan. It was enough of a confirmation to Alphys.

“YOU DO! Oh, this is totally my new favourite OTP!!”

He grimaced as she screamed gleefully and felt his face colour even more. He wouldn't discuss his stupid crush with Alphys. It wouldn't proceed to anything else than that. She lunged at him, whispering heatedly.

“have you thought how to tell her yet?! You could take her on a date, like in season 2 episode 13 of Mew Mew Kissy Cutie where she had a crush on this one boy but didn'tknowaboutherkissingpowersyetsosheplannedawholedayoutwhere-  
intheendshe'daskhimonadateaftermultipleromanticgesturesbutthen-  
sheaccidentallykissedanotherboywhofollowedheraroundenamouredand- -"

Sans had enough, he didn't need dating advice from an anime. He got up while Alphys was still ranting and rushed out to short cut to Toriel’s to bring her and Frisk back. When they returned together, food was prepared and they got to it. It was an interesting concept that Elisa had brought with her, but it would've tasted better with ketchup. They had none and he was too lazy to shortcut back home. After dinner he didn't bother paying much attention to the anime they've chosen to watch and promptly fell asleep.

His dreams were blissfully nonexistent.

_Until he was standing back in their cold living room. It was oddly dim, even though all the lights were on. Papyrus was standing in front of him, his face more grim than Sans had ever seen it be._

_“NO MATTER WHAT I DO, YOU NEVER GET BETTER.”_

_… what?_

_“I'M DISAPPOINTED IN YOU.”_

_It felt like Sans’ soul shrunk. This didn't make any sense! What had he done? What did he screw up this time?_

_“I DON'T WANT TO LIVE WITH YOU ANYMORE.”_

_n-no…_

_Papyrus had always forgiven him all his mistakes, even when Sans didn't forgive himself. Did he finally get enough of him? Sans’ bones felt heavy as lead, he couldn't move, he couldn't get a voice out of his mouth, even if he tried desperately to plead with his brother._

_please papyrus, be angry at me, shout at me, let me fix this somehow!_

_“GOOD BYE, SANS.”_

_His soul clenched again, now from panic as his brother turned towards the door. He finally found the strength to act, lurching forward._

_“p-papyrus, wait-!”_

_His body wouldn't move fast enough and it felt like the door was an infinite distance away. When he finally reached it, Sans saw how Papyrus had stepped down their front porch towards the darkness surrounding their house stopped._

_He saw the glimmer too late._

**_Shing_ **

“ ** _no!!_ ** ”

_Papyrus” head fell as his body turned to dust, leaving his armour costume behind. Sans sunk on his patellae while he watched his brothers head turn to dust, too. Sans clutched his tear stained skull as he started mumbling._

_“no no no no no… why, why this again, i can't, i c-can't, i-”_

**_Giggle_ **

_A freezing shiver ran through his spine and he jerked his head up. She was still there, barely hidden by the darkness. He could only see the shine of the dusty knife, her demonic grin and her red eyes._

_The eyes were staring at him._

_The eyes, filled with the Intent of Violence, were burning a hole through his bones_

_Sans’ bones rattled loudly as he trembled. He couldn't move not shout. The fear was consuming him. He couldn't even think about fighting for his life. All he could think about was the soul crushing loss of his brother and running away._

**_The eyes promised that he'd be next._ **

_She lunged and slashed-_

“ **hahh** hhh!”

Sans’ body jolted violently and he fell off the armchair with a thump and ‘oof’. He felt his bone bullets about to be summoned, finally acting under the paralysing fear, ready to attack any surrounding danger.

 _run, fight, do something, don't just fucking lay there, there's danger, find the target, you need to deal with it r i g h t_ **_n o w_ ** _-_

_no, stop!_

He dispelled the magic from forming just in time but it was still tingling at his phalanges, begging to be used for his protection. His soul was pounding and he was gasping for breath.

_it was a dream, it was just… another nightmare. calm down, sans!_

But he couldn't calm down. Instead, it felt like the feeling of panic, fear and loneliness were only getting stronger. His magic was going to get out of hand out of instinct if he didn't do something and fast. He blearily looked around. It was hours later, the anime had ended and he heard clinking glasses and the others shouting and laughing in the kitchen. But Elisa was in front of her. She was staring at the wall, rocking her knees back and forth, whimpering into her hand. Her soul was roiling with those self crushing feelings that were driving his magic into defence and flee mode. Fear. Loneliness. Hopelessness. He started.

_these emotions are not mine, but hers._

Feeling a twisted, inverted kind of déjà vu, Sans finally established his soul shield, feeling immense relief as he started to think clearly. As he gained control of his magic, he saw how her soul was once again filling with red with alarming rate and he got up. His instincts said that she needed to be calmed down somehow before the change was perfect.

So Sans took her where he'd want to calm down himself: somewhere peaceful, silent and where he could break down in peace. Luckily she'd known what to do when he asked, maybe from earlier experience. He made sure to make a mental note about the calming down progress as he held her and helped her breathe maybe it’ll be helpful to him in the future. Slowly her raging soul calmed down back to blue and the emotions changed to something more manageable. Even when she hugged him and got closer to his torso, breathing deeply close to his ear hole, he didn't feel the usual thrilled delight and nervousness. He was too distracted silently freaking out about his nightmare.

_that was way too fucking close._

What would’ve happened if he’d been too late taking control of his magic? He didn't want to think about it, but he'd have to either stay away from Elisa if he was asleep or he'd have to manage to keep the shield up unconsciously somehow. He’d start to study that after this mess was dealt with.

Sans winced at his nightmare. Papyrus, he’d- _no._ Sans hasn’t done anything _too_ horrible in a long time and Papyrus would never leave him just like that, he was too kind and forgiving. Sans didn’t need to worry about that, right? _right?_

While he was still contemplating what to do with himself, he still focused on calming Elisa. He relaxed slightly as she finally stopped shivering. She hugged him tighter and winced, pulling away. His small emotion of disappointment vanished and turned to  worry as he saw her bitten hand. Whatever it was that she was dealing with caused her to harm herself again. Sans knew a bit more now about human wounds since he’d studied human anatomy and rushed to find something to clean the wound with. Alphys and Undyne didn’t most likely have a first aid kit since they could heal easily with magic food and he didn’t know if they had any Monster Candy, so he just made some towels wet and brought them back. _they’d have to make do_. The wound didn’t look so deep. As he was cleaning the wound, he felt guilt swell inside her soul. She had no reason to feel that, and he wasn’t about to let her think she had.

“I’m _happy._ ”

… Was not what Sans was expecting to hear. But she clarified herself, telling she was afraid, telling that she’d lose everything and that it had happened before. He felt her deep anguish and reluctance to say anything more, and he didn’t force her. He didn’t know her background but her situation just sounded so similar to his that he felt a pang in in soul. It’s been years, but when could he ever be sure that he wouldn’t lose everyone he loved yet again? Frisk had told him time and time again that she didn’t have her powers anymore, that whatever possessed her had left her once they got out of the mountain, but his nightmares kept on haunting him, if not as often then stronger than ever. Now… Now he had even more to lose than before and he had to fight to keep that thought down or he’d spiral into despair.

This wasn’t about his problems now. He ached to know more so he could at least try to help her, but since he wasn’t ready to tell anything to her either, he felt like he hadn’t the right to ask. Silence stretched as he was pondering what he could possibly say. What could make her feel better, to make her see that what she had wasn’t going to disappear just like that- _oh._ He got an idea.

“can i try to show you something?”

He’d been planning to do this at some more calmer time, but why not now? She’d wanted to see her soul and they could test if she could actually access it. He wasn’t so sure about it himself, but it was a worth try. It would quench her curiosity somewhat and maybe make her feel better after her panic attack. Nothing could go wrong, as humans of today didn’t seem to have any aptitude with magic. If she could touch her soul, he would slowly and securely guide her with how to access her latest memories with them and to relive the moments how they’d become friends and spent time together. He’d make her search for those strong emotions of kindness and caring that she felt towards them, explaining how those traits especially would keep monsters attracted to her like bees to honey. Maybe that would assure her that her new friends would be rather hard to get rid of.

As he had expected, her face was more or less reserved but her soul was downright ecstatic, filling with curiosity, glee and flicker of doubt, pushing her anxiety down. He focused on her soul, pulling it out the way he’d only done with himself and with Papyrus when he’d been very young, to teach him about it and how to use it himself, gently and with care, pushing his calm and well-meaning emotions into it from his own soul. They weren’t even needed, as her soul popped through her chest smoothly. _how can she possibly trust me this much?_ Now that the soul was out, he could see the barrier clearer. The needles hadn’t manifested, but it still blocked the soul’s normal glow and made it blurry. Suddenly the barrier turned red and hundreds, maybe thousands of needles stuck out, shrinking back immediately as Elisa’s hand retreated with her startled shout.

 _shit!_ He forgot how it was likely to react with her. He decided to try to dispel it himself, as it had reacted well to him earlier.

Then… The barrier was gone. The room was filled with gentle soul light. As if filled with water, calm waves rippled on the small, bright blue, heart shaped soul. He saw the details of it now. It was normal for a soul to have scuffs here and there, caused by mishaps of life. Her soul however… Deep cracks that coursed through the whole soul shared it into three equally sized parts. They looked dull and worn out, old and the kind that will not heal no matter what is done. They told of deep trauma and explained some of her actions and secrecy. Had her unconsciousness created the barrier because of those painful looking cracks?

Cracks or not, her soul was still as magnificent as before, even more now. His own shield only barely held on. Not only because of the sheer strength of the emotions, but also because of his own will crumbling down.

Elisa’s emotions were amplified tenfold. Sans wanted nothing else than to feel more of them at that moment, staring at the soul, bringing his fingers closer to it’s glow. It felt like it was calling to him, urging him to manifest his own soul, to drown more into her.

He could maybe just touch it, just _graze_ it with the tip of his digit, only for a millisecond, it wouldn't be that bad, it would be _great_ , for both of them he was sure, he just wanted to, _needed_ to-

The target of the curiosity in her soul had changed to something else than the soul. What was she- She was looking at him, looking at her soul. He then realized that he was glowing, his soul had half-way manifested in his rib cage and he had been considering doing something unforgivable. Shocked, he quickly withdrew his hand and took moment to collect his thoughts.

Not only was he going to touch someone’s soul without permission, of an unaware, unsuspecting person no less, but he had also felt an ominous, animalistic urge to take the soul for himself. As if to combine with it. Maybe even… to absorb it. It had been a fleeting feeling, but a strong one. It couldn't have been that, right? He must've been overthinking about this, overwhelmed by the strong soul. It was time to focus on what his original quest was.

Sans reigned himself down and suggested her to touch the revealed soul. He'd let her marvel the feeling for a moment and then explain how to calmly start picking up separate emotions and memories. Her fingers touched the smooth surface and her breath hitched. He waited for a while.

“okay, it seems like you can touch it with no problem. how do you feel?... elisa?”

No answer. She felt calm, but her eyes were unfocused as her hand slowly surrounded the glowing organ. Then he felt her emotions start to flick to different ones, not in the normal, smooth manner but as sharp changes.

_she... she can control her soul without any guidance?_

He chuckled nervously. This was unexpected turn of events, adding to the prolonging list of questions he had about her mysterious soul, but he decided to just roll with it. Whatever made it easier to ease her mind, he supposed.

“oh, uh… alright! so it seems you’ve gotten the hang of it. just slow down with the scouring and focus on the memories of of us during the last two weeks.”

It seemed like she couldn’t hear him. On the contrary, the sense of the flicking emotions got faster. Sans felt how her emotions were fleetingly changing, first starting with mostly happy emotions, sometimes laced with short bursts of worse ones, when they completely changed into emotions of anxiety, apathy, loneliness and melancholy. Apparently she’d quickly passed the latest memories and continued scouring even deeper.

“hey bud, you gotta stop now. i get it, it might be interesting and we both know how curious you are but it’s not the best idea to plunge into old memories without preparations- elisa!”

It seemed like she was for some reason determined to continue further and deeper, as her eyebrows scrunched in concentration and her grip on the soul tightened, which Sans could feel as rising discomfort through the flicking emotions. She could seriously hurt, even kill herself if she kept that up. Sans starter to shake her from her shoulders.

“elisa snap out of it! let go of your soul!”

But she was unreachable. The emotions she was going through went past so fast that they turned into a smooth fluctuation that Sans couldn't interpret anymore. Then-

Elisa clamped down on the soul and her face was distorted with a silent scream. Red, long, magical needles could be seen prodding through her hand. They caused no physical harm, but even greater pain straight in the mind. The feeling together with whatever Elisa had tapped into in her soul almost made Sans pass out of shock.

All that was felt was pure rage and pain.

It was a torrent of uncontrollable anger and agony, a dark pit of endless suffering, she was going to die, he was going to die, they'd be sealed into that hell hole till the end of time, feeling nothing but anger and pain, _pain, pain, p a i n -_

“ ** _stop!_ ** ”

Sans’ magic had roiled inside him as panicked self defence, looking for a target to attack, to just get rid of the torment _immediately,_ but instead of blindly attacking he somehow managed to focus on the source of the pain. He wrapped her soul with his magic and wrenched it out of her hands just enough not to bring her body with it. She opened her eyes, gasping for breath that she'd been holding.

He gently placed the soul back into her and she gave out a shaky, relieved sigh. For a while they just shivered, staring at each other. The pain had lasted only for a second, but it had felt like an eternity. _absolutely not the best first impression of soul introduction._

“that... that wasn’t what i wanted to show you. you went too deep, i think.”

Elisa was overcome with exhaustion. Her soul was fully guarded, she felt so, so very numb, but crushing sadness was let through as her eyes brimmed with tears.

“I… I wanted to… I just want to remember.”

Sans wrapped her into a hopefully not too shaky hug, but he could feel his bones rattling softly?. He should've been crying too most likely, but he felt too shocked. At least he'd managed to stop her from making further damage, but instead of calming her down he'd managed to make her cry again and possibly caused some very heavy trauma. Not to mention…

_what the actual flying fuck was that?!_

 

~~~

 

They took their time yet again, just holding each other for support. Long after Elisa had stopped crying, her tears had dried and they'd been just calmly hugging and taking deep breaths did Sans finally decide to talk.

“i’m sorry. i’d wanted to guide you through it to show your good memories and emotions, but i guess my, heh, _soul searching_ plan blew up.”

Elisa was silent for a while, squeezing him a bit tighter before answering.

“I saw them. But when I realised what I was able to do... I wanted to seek further and see more.”

“how did you do that? monsters usually need to be taught to gain such a control over their souls.”

“Wish I knew. I just… went for it.”

Slowly, Sans pulled away from her torso to look at her eyes. Even if Sans couldn't have felt her emotional drain from her soul, fatigue was clearly written in her expression. Her face was red, eyes bloodshot and puffy from crying, though she wasn't sniffing anymore at least.

“may i ask why? you said something about remembering.”

She lowered her eyes at that. Turning away, she set her hands on her knees and sighed deeply.

“I have repressed memories. Psychogenic amnesia, it was used to be called. There's large gaps throughout my life that I can't remember. And I can’t remember the reason, either. Though my… soul, I could pinpoint the biggest ones, that seem to be the main reasons for my state. I just thought if I could look into them, maybe I could, I don't know, unlock the memories or something. Instead I just felt…” She turned to look at him again. “Sans, it hurt so much. Is that normal?”

Her words wrenched his soul. He felt her pain, but he couldn't tell her, not now at least. He'd never felt anything like that before and was honestly at loss.

“not at all. soul science wasn't my main research object back in underground so i haven't heard of monsters with amnesia cases, i could ask alphys if-”

Elisa grabbed his hand. “Please, I… I'd rather keep this just between us. It's a very touchy subject to me, still.”

That enormous amount of anger he'd felt… He’d never sensed anything like that from her, only from other, absolutely enraged humans. Elisa simply was the kindest human he knew. She was still keeping something from him, but he wouldn’t push her.

“... okay.”

She hesitated with something. Sans waited patiently, as she found her words.

“Could… Could you teach me again? Properly? Not now, not right after this mess, but… when it’s calmer. I think it might help. With my condition, I mean.”

“i’m not sure it’s a good idea, but we can give it a try later, carefully. i’ll make sure we’ll really get to the _soul_ of the matter, then.”

They both chuckled a bit and Sans felt happiness inside her for the first time in what felt like ages. She was smiling somewhat and looking at him. He realized that she was still holding his hand.

“Thank you, Sans. This was… Well, honestly this was horrible, but what you meant to do for me would’ve been wonderful. It means a lot to me.”

Her soul bubbled up some glee at her comment, followed by more calm, honest, happy waves directed as if right into his own soul. It felt like they melted the ice of stress away from around his soul and he felt himself relax and wound up in a different way at the same time. She squeezed his hand gently and he was almost too stunned to not squeeze back.

Sans hadn’t expected any appreciation. He honestly thought he'd messed the whole night up. At least she was honest, as always. She'd felt so much fear and pain. But there she was, ragged up but still as beautiful as ever, even more now that he’d seen what her soul looked like up close. Mystically mangled but still so strong, brilliant, gentle and kind...

_c’mon sans, move your mandible!_

“y-yeah, no proble-”

Suddenly, something large slammed against the door. Scratching noises were heard when finally, Alphys managed to haphazardly open the door while sluggishly leaning against the door frame. It looked like her grin reached to the beginning of her neck frill on both sides, as if the top part of her head was about to fall off. Her cheeks were colored red, contrasted by the natural yellow color of her scales.Sans suppressed his need to groan.

He knew what Alphys looked like when she was drunk. He also knew how terribly annoying she became.

 

“C’mon you two! We can’t-” she hiccupped, “-play shpin-the-bottle alone!”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next up... something mysterious, something sexy and some angst.
> 
> I'll finally be able to pump up the rating from Mature to Explicit. ( ͡° ͜ ʖ ͡° )

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Constructive critisism always welcome! 
> 
> Don't be afraid to leave me a comment (･∀･)  
> [+18/NSFW Tumblr](http://pancakeuniverse.tumblr.com/tagged/my-fan-fiction)


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